LIGHT   AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 


THE  CAMEL  GOT  us  THERE. 


LIGHT  AND  SHADE 
IN  WAR 


By 
CAPTAIN  MALCOLM  ROSS 

Official  War  Correspondent  with  the  New  Zealand  Forces 
(Author  of  "A  Climber  in  New  Zealand,"  etc.) 

And 

NOEL  ROSS 

Of  The  Times  (lately  Lance-Corporal  with  the  Anzacs 
and  Lieutenant  Territorial  Artillery) 


ILLUSTRATED 


Xon&on 

EDWARD   ARNOLD 

41  &  43  MADDOX  STREET,  BOND  STREET,  W 
1916 

All  rights  reserved 


•0C 
fa* 


7f  if  is  no/  u;e  «;no  /are  a/ze/c? 

Into  the  realms  of  war 
That  needs  must  have  our  hearts  annealed 

To  death,  or  wound,  or  jar  ; 
But  those  who  give  the  last  embrace, 
And  slow  their  lonely  steps  retrace. 

Brave  hearts  that  showed  no  fear. 
Fond  eyes  that  shed  no  tear. 
Our  hearts  with  theirs  in  unison 

Will  beat  howeer  we  roam, 
For  each  loved  one  our  benison — 

The  Brave  who  stayed  at  home. 


To 

THE  ONE 

WHO  WAITED 

WITH 

ALL 

OUR  LOVE 


520354 


PREFACE 

THE  authors  of  this  book,  father  and  son, 
have  seen  much  of  the  Light  and  Shade  of 
War  during  the  past  two  years,  the  one  as  a  War 
Correspondent  in  Egypt,  Turkey  and  France,  the 
other  as  a  soldier,  and,  afterwards,  as  one  of  the 
staff  of  The  Times. 

The  day  for  writing  the  histories  of  our  different 
campaigns  is  not  yet.  For  the  purposes  of  history 
delay  is  necessary,  even  though  the  gain  in  per- 
spective may  mean  loss  in  colour.  But  there  is 
a  legitimate  desire  for  the  intimate  and  immediate 
impressions  of  the  time,  written  down  amid  the 
ever-shifting  scenes  of  the  War  itself.  Such 
impressions  will  have  some  value  now,  and  perhaps 
also  in  after  years. 

Most  of  these  sketches  were  written  whilst  the 
scenes  and  incidents  they  depict  were  fresh  in  the 
mind  ;  some  under  fire.  The  proofs  were  corrected 
on  the  battlefield  of  the  Sommein  a  tent  over  which 
British  and  German  shells  were  passing  at  the  time. 
While  due  allowance  will  be  made  for  shortcomings 

vii 


viii  PREFACE 

owing  to  the  circumstances  under  which  the  book 
was  produced,  the  authors  hope  that  no  apology 
will  be  needed  for  presenting  such  pictures  of  the 
Light  and  Shade  of  War  to  the  English-speaking 
World. 

They  wish  to  express  their  thanks  to  the 
proprietors  of  Punch  for  the  right  to  republish 
"Abdul,"  "The  Grist  House,"  and  "Benevolent 
Neutrality."  The  following  are  included  by 
courtesy  of  The  Times  : — "  The  Landing,"  "  Oak- 
Apple  Day,"  "  St.  Paul's  and  the  Abbey,"  "  Lon- 
don Ghosts,"  "  Men  of  the  Glen,"  "  The  Home 
of  My  Fathers,"  "  Tipirere,"  "  Groups  in  Camp," 
"Golfers  from  the  Sea,"  "The  Coast-Guard, " 
"The  Battle  Cruisers,"  "  Building  the  Warships," 
"Playing  the  Bye."  The  article  "A  Kneeling 
Hamlet "  is  from  the  pen  of  "  The  One  who 
Stayed  at  Home,"  and  appeared  first  in  The 
Times. 

August  4,  1916. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

THE  LAST. LOAD i 

BENEVOLENT  NEUTRALITY 8 

THE  LANDING 13 

ABDUL:  AN  APPRECIATION 23 

Two  LETTERS       .         .         .         .         .         .  27 

IN  THE  TRACK  OF  THE  TROOPS      ....  36 

THE  GROUND  WE  WON 45 

THE  EDGE  OF  THE  BARLEY  FIELD          ...  54 

ON  THE  FRINGES  OF  WAR  .  61 

ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC 68 

GOOD-BYE  TO  ABDUL     ......  86 

INTO  THE  DESERT 93 

THE  BLOODING  OF  THE  BATTALION         .         .         .  103 

ST.  PAUL'S  AND  THE  ABBEY          ....  108 

OAK-APPLE  DAY 114 

THE  MAN  WITH  THE  FEARLESS  EYES      .         .         .118 

LONDON  GHOSTS 124 

MEN  OF  THE  GLEN 128 

THE  HOME  OF  MY  FATHERS 133 

ix 


x  CONTENTS 

PAGE 
"TlPIRERE" 139 

THE  NEW  TREK 144 

How  THE  ANZACS  CAME  TO  FRANCE      .        .         .150 

THE  SPIRIT  OF  A  NATION 158 

BEHIND  THE  LINES 167 

GROUPS  IN  CAMP 172 

A  CHEERFUL  ARMY        .         .         .         .         .         .176 

BATTLE  SOUNDS 183 

AN  INTERLUDE  IN  WAR         .         ...         .         .189 

FIVE  MEN  FROM  LONDON      .....     196 

THE  RAIDERS 200 

LAUNCHING  THE  GREAT  ATTACK    .         .         .         .215 

FRICOURT  AND  LA  BOISELLE 222 

GOLFERS  FROM  THE  SEA 233 

THE  COAST-GUARD 238 

THE  BATTLE  CRUISERS 243 

BUILDING  THE  WARSHIPS 251 

THE  GRIST  HOUSE 259 

PLAYING  THE  BYE 265 

THE  KNEELING  HAMLET 269 

THE  UNBURIED 273 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

The  Camel  got  us  there  Frontispiece 

Where  Napoleon  mounted  his  Guns     .  To  face  p.      34 

The  Last  Load          .  52 

Graves  on  Gallipoli    ....  „              52 

Abodes  of  an  Anzac  ....  ,,              69 

The  Chateau  Pericles          .  82 

The  Hot  Pools  in  the  Ti-Tree      .         .  „            142 

The  Gun  astern  was  ready          .         .  „            152 

In  the  Track  of  the  Caravans      .         .  ,,            152 

The  Silver  Sausage     .  188 

The  Heights  of  Anzac         .  188 


THE  LAST  LOAD 

ON  days  when  bullets  fell  like  heavy  hail,  and 
shrapnel  and  high  explosive  came  tearing 
through  the  air  towards  trench  and  pier  and  bivouac, 
one  watched  with  curious  interest  the  sweating 
stretcher-bearers  with  straining  thews  carrying  their 
inert  burdens  down  the  narrow  paths  of  the  deres 
to  the  dressing-stations,  and  from  the  latter  to  the 
Casualty  Clearing  Stations.  One  saw  also,  with  a 
sadness  relieved  by  their  uncomplaining  bravery, 
the  line  of  blood-stained  wounded  marching  slowly 
along  the  winding,  dusty  sap  to  the  jetties  where  the 
motor-launch  was  waiting  to  take  them  to  the  safer 
haven  of  the  Hospital  Ships.  The  badly  wounded 
and  the  very  sick  were  carried  down  under  cover  of 
the  darkness.  The  Sea  of  Saros  in  its  summer 
calm  reflected  the  graceful  lines  of  these  ships 
floating  between  the  blue  of  a  cloudless  sky  and  the 
deeper  blue  of  the  glassy  water.  In  the  night-time 
their  lights  sent  shimmering  lines  of  red  and  green 
and  gold  towards  the  shore — beckoning  fingers  to 
the  sick  and  wounded.  There  was  always  a  ship, 
sometimes  two  or  three  ships,  there,  waiting — wait- 
ing for  its  load  from  the  wreckage  of  the  battlefield. 


2      ;V.:LlG^TiisSn^ilAJ!)E  IN  WAR 

As  soon  as  one  went  another  took  its  place.  Imagi- 
nation followed  them  to  the  outer  islands  and  the 
other  lands  where  they  unloaded  their  battered 
freight,  and  wondered  how  many  moons  would  come 
and  go  before  they  steamed  away  with  their  last 
load.  The  day  came  much  sooner  than  we  expected. 

On  a  grey  morning,  with  the  smoke  of  our  burn- 
ing stores  rising  in  a  straight  column  and  mingling 
with  the  mists  that  shrouded  the  heights  of  the 
Peninsula,  two  war  correspondents,  whose  home  had 
been  at  Anzac  and  No.  2  Outpost,  left  the  shores- 
of  Anzac  for  the  last  time  to  witness  from  a  warship 
the  closing  scenes  of  the  great  drama.  Looking 
back  at  the  receding  outlines  of  the  high  land  loom- 
ing through  the  smoke  and  mist  above  the  leaden 
water  one  remembered  the  broad  atmospheric 
effects  of  Turner  :  the  dim  blurred  efforts  of  Whistler. 
Out  of  the  greyness  the  warship  itself  appeared 
suddenly  as  a  spectral  form.  The  little  pinnace 
came  almost  to  a  dead  stop  under  the  great  white- 
painted  hull  of  an  Allan  liner — a  hospital  ship 
awaiting  her  last  load.  It  was  the  fate  of  one  of  the 
war  correspondents  to  watch  the  closing  scene  from 
a  port-hole  in  this  ship,  the  while  the  Officers' 
Ward  slowly  filled  with  sick  and  wounded. 

It  was  Sunday — day  of  battles — and  while  the 
Padre  was  cheering  the  sick,  and  the  doctors  and 
nurses  were  dressing  the  wounded,  enemy  shells  were 
bursting  in  our  trenches.  The  Turks  had  blown 
up  a  mine  and  were  "  strafing  "  Hill  60.  The 
Apex  got  its  share,  and  Suvla  too.  Our  own  de- 


THE  LAST  LOAD  3 

pleted  batteries  made  feeble  reply,  for  it  was  the 
"  last  day  "  and  nearly  all  the  guns  had  gone. 
All  this  one  could  see  dimly  through  the  greyness. 
Abdul — unaware  of  the  fact — was  sending  us  our 
last  load. 

It  came  as  a  sad  surprise  to  fin<J  two  of  one's  own 
friends  already  in  the  cots  occupied  by  the  wounded. 
One,  hard  hit  with  shrapnel,  was  struggling  bravely 
against  the  Grim  Warrior  who  so  often  settles  the 
accounts  of  wounded  soldiers.  But  a  few  hours 
before,  we  had  laughingly  said  good-bye  to  one 
another  at  Anzac,  promising  ourselves  a  good  time 
in  Egypt,  or  England,  or  wherever  we  were  going 
to  in  the  near  future.  Brave  fellow  !  He  almost 
won  through. 

By  noon  the  Officers'  Ward  began  to  fill.  Two 
Gurkhas — the  one  moaning,  the  other  sadly  silent 
and  still — headed:  the  procession.  They  were 
victims  of  the  explosion  on  Hill  60.  The  little 
Subadar,  in  great  pain,  fought  with  his  hands — they 
were  small,  like  a  woman's — as  they  lifted  him 
from  stretcher  to  cot.  Following  these  two  came 
other  wounded,  and  some  sick.  These  sick  had 
been  fighting  disease  and  doctors  in  a  vain  hope 
that  they  might  be  with  the  "  Diehards  "  at  the 
finish.  One  was  an  Anzac  Battalion  Commander — 
a  man  who  had  seen  the  world.  Straining  his 
memory  for  a  few  Indian  phrases  learnt  in  the  long 
ago  he  tried  to  calm  the  wounded  Subadar.  He 
could  not  rest  in  his  own  bed,  but  wandered  through 
the  ward,  going  from  cot  to  cot,  gazing  at  each 


4  LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

patient  very  much  as  a  curious  robin  might  look 
at  objects  that  were  strange  to  him.  To  the  doctor 
who  questioned  him  he  said  he  was  quite  well.  But 
another  Anzac  officer  told  us  the  true  story.  He  had 
been  wounded  in  the  landing  and  wounded  again — 
riddled,  the  officer  called  it — in  the  Lone  Pine  affair. 
You  will  remember  that  there  were  seven  V.C.'s  for 
Lone  Pine.  Shipped  to  England  he  had  finally 
broken  loose  from  the  doctors,  paid  his  passage 
back  to  Egypt,  and  rejoined  his  battalion  on  Gal- 
lipoli.  But  the  strain  had  been  too  great.  Wounds 
and  sickness  had  told  their  tale.  He  had  broken 
down  at  the  finish.  The  word  "  debility "  had 
been  written  opposite  his  name. 

The  Officers'  Ward  filled  slowly  until  darkness 
descended  upon  us.  Through  the  port-hole  we 
could  see  on  the  hills  the  well-remembered  beacon 
lamps — signals  beyond  which  the  Navy  could  shoot 
at  night.  A  few  lights  still  glimmered  in  the  dug- 
outs of  the  almost  depopulated  Corps  and  Divisional 
Headquarters.  Fitful  gleams  from  incinerators 
pierced  the  darkness,  and  the  great  glow  of  the 
still  burning  provision  depot  illumined  the  sky. 

Time  passed  and  the  ship's  wireless  buzzed  the 
signal  for  departure.  The  anchor  chain  rattled. 
The  screws  began  to  turn,  and  the  ship  steamed 
slow  ahead,  carrying  her  last  load  across  the  Gulf  of 
Saros. 

There  had  been  no  Turkish  attack :  there  were 
still  empty  cots  in  the  Hospital  Ships  ;  the  evacua- 
tion was  almost  at  an  end  !  Fed  and  washed,  and 


THE  LAST  LOAD  5 

with  their  wounds  dressed,  the  patients,  one  by 
one,  fell  into  the  troubled  sleep  that  is  their  lot. 
Even  "  Debility  "  was  in  the  land  of  dreams.  The 
wakeful,  with  all  their  recent  hopes  and  fears  now 
behind  them,  lay  thinking — listening  the  while  to 
the  slow,  monotonous  throb  of  the  engines  and  the 
soothing  swish  of  water  along  the  ship's  side.  The 
night  nurse — a  tall,  bright,  capable  English  girl — 
went  quietly  through  the  ward,  smoothing  a  pillow 
here,  talking  softly  to  a  restless  patient  there. 

The  Subadar  awoke  with  a  moan  and  a  cry  of 
"Water!  Water!"  The  sister  was  quickly  at 
his  side.  In  his  delirium  his  little  brown  hand 
gripped  her  slender  arm  with  all  its  power.  The 
grip  hurt,  but  she  bore  it  uncomplainingly,  as  she 
tried  to  calm  her  patient. 

Over  the  other  Indian  a  doctor,  with  another 
sister  in  attendance,  was  bending  thoughtfully, 
listening.  For  this  one  there  was  nothing  more 
to  be  done.  They  lowered  the  curtains  from  the 
brass  rods  above  his  cot,  and  left  him  there  with 
a  light  brightly  burning.  He  had  never  once 
spoken.  Unconsciously,  and  without  a  moan,  he 
had  passed  into  the  Unknown.  The  Reaper  had 
claimed  his  last  toll  from  the  Hill :  he  had  lightened 
the  last  load  from  the  Peninsula.  When,  far  into 
the  night,  we  looked  again,  the  cot  was  empty. 
Then  the  slow  throb  of  the  engines  became  still 
slower,  the  swish  of  little  waves  along  the  ship's 
side  died  away.  There  was  a  splash  in  the  dark 
water  !  The  fire-bars  at  his  feet  were  carrying  him 


6  LIGHT  AND   SHADE   IN  WAR 

down — one  more  body  to  dot  the  line  of  sleeping 
soldiers  marking  the  ways  of  the  white  ships  from 
Gallipoli  to  Lemnos,  to  Malta,  to  Alexandria — 
even  to  Mother  England.  On  the  floor  of  the  sea 
these  lines  still  lie,  with  the  dim  shadows  of  the 
submarines  passing  over  them,  after  all  the  living 
have  sailed  away.  It  was  not  only  on  the  heights 
of  Anzac  that  our  gallant  dead  found  sepulture. 
Yet  would  we  fain  believe  that  not  one  life  had 
been  given,  not  one  drop  of  blood  shed  in  vain. 

The  other  Indian,  knowing  nothing  of  all  this, 
had  fallen  asleep,  and  quiet  reigned  once  more  in 
the  ward.  The  silence  was  broken  with  the  strong 
voice  of  command — 

"  Get  that  gun  !     Get  that  gun  !  " 

It  was  the  voice  of  "  Debility."  He  was  fighting 
his  battles  over  again  in  dreamland.  One  pictured 
the  scene — the  brave  Anzacs  leaving  their  trench  : 
charging  forward  to  almost  certain  death  ;  the  usual 
machine  guns  on  the  flanks  mowing  them  down  ; 
then  the  enemy  trench — bombs  and  the  bayonet  ! 
Moving  quickly  but  quietly  through  the  ward  the 
sister  was  at  his  side  soothing  him  back  to  slumber. 
Then  silence  reigned  again.  There  was  not  even  a 
moan.  It  was  weirdly  uncanny.  In  less  than  ten 
minutes  the  quiet  was  broken  with  another  ringing 
command — 

"  Hang  on  the  Force  !  Hang  on  the  Force  ! 
Steady  there,  men  !  Stick  it  out  !  " 

Yes,  without  a  doubt,  it  was  Lone  Pine.  He  had 
won  his  trench  and  was  holding  it.  But  there  was  a 


THE  LAST  LOAD  7 

fringe  of  dead  along  the  parapet,  and  a  thousand 
dead — friend  and  foe — inside  the  trench.  The 
seven  V.C.'s — aye,  many  more — had  been  honourably 
won. 

When  dawn  had  come  we  were  once  more  at 
anchor,  and  the  cirque  of  brown  hills  that  rise 
above  the  Lemnos  harbour  lay  around  us.  Five 
hundred  sick  and  wounded  that  had  been  transferred 
to  a  trooper  from  this  same  ship  in  the  earlier 
stages  of  the  evacuation  were  now  re-embarked. 
Again  the  anchor  chain  rattled  in  the  winch,  and 
this  time  the  ship  headed,  full  speed,  for  Egypt. 

A  little  less  than  two  days  brought  us  into  port 
again.  The  two  New  Zealanders  in  the  Officers' 
Ward  parted  company,  for  they  were  going  into 
different  hospitals.  The  sorely  stricken  one  was 
still  brave  and  cheerful.  They  said  good-bye, 
promising  each  other  a  dinner  at  Shepheard's  in  the 
near  future.  But  that  dinner,  like  many  another 
promised  dinner  in  the  great  war,  was  never  eaten. 
Opposite  the  name  of  the  one,  next  day,  appeared 
the  three  words  that  have  meant  tears  in  many  a 
distant  home — "  Died  of  wounds."  The  big  letter 
of  credit  that  he  had  been  solicitous  about  did  not 
matter  now.  The  little  Bible,  "  with  love  to 
Daddy,"  written  in  the  half-formed  hand  of  a  little 
child,  perhaps  did.  While  the  ship  lay  empty  at 
the  quay  he  had  set  out,  smiling,  on  his  great 
journey.  He  had  come  bravely  through  with  the 
last  load. 


BENEVOLENT  NEUTRALITY 

I  KNOW  a  man  who  was  ten  months  at  the  Front 
dodging  coal-boxes  and  "  Black  Marias."  He 
came  home  last  month  and  broke  his  leg  trying  to 
dodge  a  perambulator  at  Hyde  Park  Corner.  My 
case  is  somewhat  similar.  At  Gallipoli  I  dodged 
dysentery,  jaundice  and  kindred  ills,  but  at  last  I 
met  my  fate.  A  few  days  ago  I  was  vaguely  con- 
scious of  a  nagging  pain  under  the  two  back  buttons 
of  my  trousers  and  in  my  left  knee  and  foot.  I  told 
the  Adjutant  and  found  him  interested  but  not 
sympathetic. 

"  You've  got  sciatica, "  he  said  exultingly.  "  Do 
you  feel  tired  in  the  small  of  your  back  ?  Have  you 
pains  in  your  hip  and  down  your  legs,  and  aches 
in  your  feet  ?  " 

I  confessed  to  all  these  symptoms. 

"  Ah  !  "  he  said,  "  shocking  thing  that.  Had  an 
aunt  who  died  of  it  once.  Plays  the  deuce  with  a 
man  of  your  age.  You  had  better  see  the  Doc. 
right  away.  He'll  get  a  board  fixed  up  for  you." 

He  pushed  the  bell  and  the  mess  corporal  ap- 
peared. 

"  Bring  me  a  long  whisky,"  he  said. 

"  Me,  too,"  I  murmured. 
8 


BENEVOLENT  NEUTRALITY  9 

The  Adjutant  looked  aghast.  "  Whisky  with 
sciatica  !  "  he  exclaimed. 

"  No,  with  soda/'  I  said. 

"  All  right,"  said  he,  "  it's  your  funeral." 

The  next  day  the  doctor  came  and  gloated  over 
me.  "  Does  that  hurt  ?  "  he  asked,  sticking  a 
stubby  thumb  into  the  small  of  my  back.  3 

He  looked  resentfully  at  me  as  he  picked  himself 
up  from  the  floor. 

"  I'm  sorry,"  I  told  him,  "  but  I  was  scarcely 
ready  for  that." 

"  You  can  be  boarded  to-morrow,"  he  said  as  he 
left  hurriedly. 

I  was  boarded,  and  got  a  month's  leave  and 
some  advice.  I  was  told  to  go  to  one  Friedenborg 
for  massage,  and  I  went. 

Friedenborg  proved  to  be  a  pleasant-faced  Swede, 
but  his  looks  belied  him.  The  Grand  Inquisitors 
of  Spain  were  novices  to  him.  He  ushered  me  into 
a  small  room  and  in  an  unguarded  moment  I  allowed 
myself  to  be  divested  of  all  clothing  and  laid  face 
downwards  on  a  velvet  couch.  I  hate  velvet  at 
any  time.  The  touch  of  velvet  or  peach-skins  is 
enough  to  make  my  teeth  go  on  edge  all  down  my 
back. 

The  Swede  stood  over  me  with  the  expression  of 
Jack  Johnson  just  before  he  hit  up  the  Bowery  Pet 
at  Bashville,  Illinois. 

"  I  think  this  is  the  place,"  he  said  as  he  made  a 
savage  jab  at  the  back  of  my  thigh. 

"  I  can  feel  it,"  I  said  as  I  came  down  on  the  sofa 


io          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

again.  I  made  up  my  mind  not  to  let  him  see  my 
true  feelings  and  composed  myself  to  die  as  an 
English  gentleman  should,  although  it  hurt  my 
pride  to  meet  my  end  at  the  hands  of  a  neutral. 

Presently  he  brought  out  a  table  with  an  instru- 
ment upon  it  like  an  overgrown  dentist's  drill. 
At  the  end  of  a  cable  were  two  hard  rubber  balls. 
These  he  put  on  the  middle  of  my  back  and  then 
turned  over  a  switch. 

"It  is  a  vibrator,"  he  hissed  between  his  teeth. 
I  had  almost  guessed  it  myself,  but  I  did  not  argue. 

Shutting  my  eyes  I  could  easily  imagine  myself 
in  a  London  bus,  and  if  any  one  had  called,  "  Fares, 
please,"  I'd  have  felt  for  my  pocket,  which  wasn't 
there.  Just  when  I  was  getting  used  to  the  thing 
he  stopped.  "  Marble  Arch  ?  "  I  hazarded,  but  he 
was  in  no  mood  for  humour.  He  got  to  work  with 
his  hands. 

First  of  all  he  kneaded  my  hip- joint  into  a  soft 
dough,  which  he  pulled  out  into  strings  like  an 
American  shop-girl  with  her  chewing-gum.  Then 
he  let  them  go  again  like  loosened  pieces  of  elastic. 
He  burrowed  in  amongst  my  joints  like  a  terrier 
at  a  rabbit-hole,  all  the  time  giving  little  grunts  of 
satisfaction  when  I  jumped.  Soon  I  got  wiser, 
and  when  he  hurt  most  I  lay  still,  and  jumped  when 
he  got  on  to  a  comparatively  painless  spot.  By 
this  simple  stratagem  I  contrived  to  keep  him  busy 
without  disappointing  him  or  depriving  him  of  his 
exercise.  I  rather  wished  he  had  been  a  real  in- 
quisitor, for  I  would  have  become  a  Brahmin  or 


BENEVOLENT  NEUTRALITY  n 

even  a  Buff  Orpington  to  have  him  stop.  Any  old 
creed  would  have  done  me  if  he  would  only  have 
left  me  alone. 

Then  a  galling  thought  crossed  my  mind.  I  was 
paying  him  to  do  all  this,  and  only  the  week  before 
I  had  sworn  off  theatres  because  I  considered  them 
extravagant  in  war-time. 

Presently  he  transferred  his  attentions  to  my 
spine.  He  played  at  being  a  devout  monk,  using 
my  vertebrae  as  a  rosary.  He  took  each  of  them 
separately  and  ran  them  along  my  spinal  cord  like 
beads  on  a  Chinese  abacus,  clicking  them  together. 

In  between  the  more  strenuous  efforts  he  dis- 
coursed on  the  war.  "  The  Germans  will  soon 
begin  to  feel  the  pinch,"  he  said  suddenly  as  he 
grabbed  a  handful  of  flesh  from  my  back. 

"  If  it's  a  pinch  like  that  I  almost  feel  sorry  for 
them,"  I  thought. 

"  But  is  this  blockade  stopping  their  food  ?  "  he 
demanded,  as  he  ran  a  row  of  horny  knuckles  up  my 
back. 

"  Ah,"  I  said,  "  there's  the  rub." 

He  discoursed  on  the  Western  offensive,  and  gave 
an  imitation  of  trench-digging  on  my  hip- joint. 
Then  he  talked  about  mining  and  ran  out  a  whole 
series  of  deep  saps  from  my  ankle  to  my  knee, 
counter-mining  on  the  other  leg  until  he  ended  with 
an  explosive  burst  that  would  have  destroyed  a 
whole  battalion.  I  bit  hard  into  the  wooden  head- 
rail  of  the  sofa  for  the  rest  of  the  seance,  and  at  last 
he  finished. 


12         LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

Before  I  knew  what  was  happening  he  had  booked 
another  appointment  for  the  next  day. 

Since  then  I  have  been  again  many  times,  and 
all  my  pains  have  fled.  The  little  devils  in  charge 
of  the  sciatica  department  gave  it  best,  and  realized 
that  the  Swede  was  their  master.  My  mental  out- 
look has  changed  also,  for  at  first  I  prayed  nightly 
that  England  would  declare  war  on  Sweden.  Now 
I  am  grateful,  and  fully  recognize  the  meaning  of  a 
benevolent  neutrality. 


THE  LANDING 

rHE  following  grim  and  characteristic  story  of  the 
landing  on  the  Gallipoli  Peninsula — five  days  of 
hell,  as  he  himself  calls  it — is  told  by  a  New  Zealander 
who  took  part  in  the  fighting.  In  a  covering  letter  the 
writer  says  :  "  I  have  had  my  second  turn  with  the 
'  unspeakable  Turk  '  and  as  a  result  am  in  hospital  with 
a  wrecked  spine  and  rather  a  badly  tangled  set  of  nerves, 
caused  through  concussion  from  a  shell  and  a  fall. 
The  enclosed  is  perhaps  crude,  but  I  made  rather 
an  effort  to  write  it,  and  Nurse  says  '  never  again  ' — 
for  a  while  anyhow." 

The  "  enclosed  "  is  probably  the  most  vivid  personal 
narrative  of  the  Gallipoli  fighting  which  has  yet  reached 
this  country. — THE  TIMES. 

A  MILITARY  HOSPITAL,  CAIRO, 

MAY  5. 

A  glass  flat  sea  covered  with  "a  shallow  mist,  and 
beyond,  the  tops  of  green  hills  peering  through 
the  vapour,  dim  shapes  of  warboats  and  transports, 
and  a  fleeting  glimpse  of  a  seaplane  as  it  winged 
over  the  Turkish  positions :  this  was  the  scene 

13 


14          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

that  met  our  eyes  on  the  morning  of  April  25  when 
we  approached  the  peninsula  of  Gallipoli.  Drown- 
ing the  noise  of  the  winches  in  our  transport  there 
rose  and  fell  the  thunderous  arpeggio  of  the  heavy 
guns,  ceaseless  in  its  monotonous  roar,  but,  as  we 
drew  nearer,  relieved  by  the  staccato  crack  of  the 
bursting  Turkish  shrapnel  and  the  plunge  of  the 
heavier  shell  in  the  water  amongst  the  transports. 

As  we  approached  the  shore  there  came  to  our 
ears  the  continuous  rattle  of  musketry,  first  scarcely 
perceptible,  but  at  last  growing  to  an  ear-racking 
roll  as  of  giant  kettle-drums  beaten  without  reason. 
Through  glasses  I  could  see  one  of  our  skirmishing 
lines  advancing  from  the  boats  on  the  beach.  It 
was  as  though  one  watched  a  cinematograph  screen. 
The  white  boats  on  the  beach  and  some  brown 
figures  sadly  still  on  the  grey  sand,  the  green  grass, 
and  a  tilled  field  across  which  advanced  lines  of  our 
attacking  force  formed  the  foreground.  Steep 
hills,  clay  faced  and  covered  with  dense  scrub  and 
dwarf  ilex,  over  which  the  cottonwool  puffs  of 
shrapnel  appeared  and  disappeared,  made  the  back- 
ground. 

Business-like  and  brisk  a  destroyer  glided  along- 
side our  transport  towing  strings  of  heavy  barges. 

"  What's  it  like  over  there  ?  "  we  asked. 

"  Pretty  warm,  boy,"  answered  a  smiling  gunner, 
"  but  they're  on  the  run." 

Straight  to  the  beach  we  ran,  to  the  foot  of  the 
hill,  but  the  destroyer  necessarily  could  not  take  us 
right  in  to  the  sand,  and  we  lay  smiling  sickly  smiles 


THE  LANDING  15 

at  each  other  as  the  bullets  purred  and  whistled 
over  and  round  us.  The  sharp-pointed  bullet 
"  meows  "  like  a  motherless  kitten  as  it  passes 
you,  but  it  enters  the  water  with  a  "  phut  "  that 
suggests  something  more  unpleasant. 

At  last  the  barges  were  taken  as  far  in  as  possible 
and  we  jumped  into  water  up  to  our  armpits  and 
half  swam,  half  waded  ashore.  I  had  often  won- 
dered how  one  would  feel  going  into  a  tight  corner 
for  the  first  time,  and  then  I  knew.  It  was  as  if 
some  one  had  given  me  a  smack  below  the  chest 
with  the  flat  of  a  heavy  spade.  Later  came  a  sense 
of  elation. 

Formed  up  we  marched  along  the  beach  past 
dressing-stations  already  hemmed  in  with  stretchers 
and  wounded  men.  An  Australian  and  a  sailor 
lay  beneath  an  oil  sheet,  their  feet  in  the  little  waves. 

"  Reinforcements  at  the  double  on  the  left," 
roared  an  officer  through  a  megaphone,  and  then 
added  as  a  shell  burst  overhead,  "  Keep  in  under 
the  bank — shrapnel's  unhealthy." 

Then  came  a  toilsome,  tiresome  scramble  over 
the  high  bluffs  to  the  firing  line.  On  the  top  of  the 
first  ridge  we  came  through  a  Turkish  trench.  In  it 
were  a  dead  Turk,  bayoneted,  a  box  of  ammunition, 
and  many  flies.  Stooping  low  we  doubled  to  the 
brow,  ever  with  the  purring  bullets  overhead. 
Wounded  on  the  way  to  the  beach  passed  us  cheer- 
fully, saying,  "  It's  hot  as  hell  up  there  !  "  And 
it  was.  When  we  had  crossed  a  gully  and  gained 
another  ridge,  half  an  hour's  scrambling  and  sliding, 


16          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

we  were  scarce  200  yards  from  the  last,  so  steep  is  the 
ground. 

Snipers  were  everywhere,  and  as  we  made  one 
descent  of  about  100  feet,  at  an  angle  of  about  10 
degrees  past  90,  bullets  spattered  about  on  the 
stones  and  in  the  bushes  round  us.  I  struck  a  shingle 
slide  and  my  downfall  was  expedited. 

At  the  bottom  I  saw  a  wounded  man  bleeding 
badly  over  one  shoulder.  He  grinned  hideously 
with  his  shattered  mouth.  "  Got  it  where  the 
chicken  got  the  axe/'  he  wheezed,  and  fainted  as 
the  stretcher-bearers  came  up  for  him. 

And  so  on,  up  to  the  firing  line,  where  I  got 
separated  from  my  own  unit  and  found  ranges,  that 
being  my  job,  for  an  Australian  regiment.  Through 
the  powerful  telescope  of  the  range-finder  I  could 
see  the  Turkish  retirement  and  then  an  embryo 
bayonet  charge  by  some  of  our  men.  Still  the 
wounded  came  back  in  apparently  endless  pro- 
cession. They  were  wonderful,  cheerful,  and  full 
of  information  and  profanity. 

Then  in  our  trench  things  began  to  happen. 
Personally  I  think  a  sniper  spotted  the  range-finder, 
for  two  bullets  lobbed  into  the  trench  parapet  and 
then  the  man  next  to  me  stood  straight  up  and 
fell  back  over  my  legs.  "  Mafeesh,"  he  said 
quaintly,  the  Arabic  for  finished,  and  then  more 
slowly,  "  Money-belt — missus  and  kids — dirty 
swine,  dirty " 

Then  a  strange  thing  happened.  Dying,  shattered 
beyond  recognition,  he  rose  to  his  knees  and  dragged 


THE  LANDING  17 

his  rifle  to  the  parapet.  With  a  weak  finger  he 
took  shaky  aim  at  the  sky  and  fired  his  last 
shot,  to  collapse  finally  in  the  bottom  of  the 
trench. 

Obviously  the  Turks  had  our  range,  for  things 
began  to  get  too  hot  for  comfort.  Those  who  were 
left  of  us  changed  position  about  a  hundred  yards 
along  the  trench,  one  of  the  Australians  first  resting 
a  dead  man's  hat  on  a  bush  on  the  trench  parapet. 
"  Got  our  range,"  he  said  laconically,  "  better  let 
'em  have  a  little  target  practice."  They  did,  for  the 
hat  only  stayed  there  five  minutes. 

Then  we  spotted  our  sniper.  Have  you  ever 
gone  stalking  in  open  country  with  only  dry  water- 
courses or  stone  slides  as  cover  and  a  Royal  smelling 
danger  on  the  slope  opposite  ?  It  was  rather  like 
that. 

Two  of  our  men  crept  from  the  trench  and  crawled 
out  of  sight  through  the  bushes.  All  unconscious 
the  Turk  continued  his  rifle  practice  until  a  double 
report  rang  out  and  our  two  men  appeared  on 
our  left  waving  the  sniper's  hat — their  equivalent 
of  a  scalp.  After  that  we  had  comparative 
peace. 

Away  to  the  right  a  machine  gun,  like  a  motor- 
cycle, purred  incessantly,  and  then  one  started 
nearer  and  to  our  front.  A  seaplane  from  the  Ark 
Royal,  anchored  in  the  bay  behind,  soared  overhead, 
and  twice  white  puffs  of  shrapnel  appeared  below 
her,  where  the  Turks  lobbed  two  shells.  It  is 
rather  like  shooting  at  a  rocketing  pheasant,  this 


i8          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

aeroplane-potting,  and  has  about  the  same  result. 
Then  she  turned  and  went  back  to  report. 

Something  was  due  to  arrive  and  it  did,  suddenly, 
in  the  shape  of  a  naval  shell.  First  came  the  ear- 
and-nerve-shattering  roar  of  the  gun,  then  the 
shriek  of  the  shell  overhead,  and  away  in  front  a 
cloud  of  smoke  and  earth  rose  slowly  and  drifted 
away,  showing  a  gap  in  the  skyline  and  a  few 
Turks,  who  obviously  recollected  that  it  was  about 
time  to  start  for  the  last  train  to  Gallipoli.  Away 
they  went  out  of  sight,  and  then  the  naval  guns 
started  in  earnest. 

From  the  bay  below  came  one  continuous  thunder, 
and  the  screech  of  the  heavy  projectiles  was  inces- 
sant. No  sooner  had  one  burst  than  another  was 
on  its  way. 

Presently  the  15-inchers  started  and  we  tore 
up  some  "  pull-through  "  rag  to  put  in  our  ears. 
Commands,  unless  shouted,  were  unintelligible 
now,  and  one  felt  ridiculous  yelling  against  such 
thunderous  voices.  Below  in  the  bay  a  warship 
was  firing  salvoes  from  her  6-inch  battery.  Puffs 
of  brown  smoke  would  jet  from  the  bulwarks,  and 
then,  a  long  while  afterwards,  the  roll  of  reports 
would  shake  the  hills. 

Then  the  enemy's  guns  joined  in  the  argument. 
Shrapnel  began  to  burst  above  us,  and  the  whistle 
of  the  flying  bullets  was  everywhere.  The  brass 
nose  of  a  howitzer  shell  struck  from  nowhere  upon 
a  mound  in  front  and  rolled  into  the  trench.  I 
burned  my  fingers  picking  it  up.  For  three  hours 


THE  LANDING  19 

this  violent  cannonading  lasted  and  then  it  gave  place 
to  a  more  desultory,  but  still  severe,  bombard- 
ment. 

We  had  gained  our  footing,  at  heavy  cost  it  is 
true,  but  at  least  a  mile  square  of  the  Gallipoli 
Peninsula  was  ours,  and  Von  der  Goltz  Pasha  was 
proved  a  liar.  Back  on  the  beach  stores  were  be- 
ginning to  come  in.  Horses,  donkeys,  and  mules 
were  landed  and  ammunition  reserves  grew  as  one 
watched.  Men  were  carrying  water  to  the  firing 
line,  ammunition  and  oil  for  the  machine  guns. 
On  every  path  the  stretcher-bearers  toiled  with 
their  sad  loads,  and  wounded  waited  patiently  in 
little  knots  by  the  dressing-stations,  laughing, 
chatting,  and  cheering  each  other.  Sweating  under 
the  hot  sun  the  doctors  worked  like  machines, 
probing,  washing,  bandaging.  Often  the  hurts  were 
beyond  aid,  and  a  handkerchief  covered  the  face  of 
one  man  I  had  known  as  a  cheery  optimist  on  board 
the  transport.  The  Brigadier-General  in  khaki 
shirt  and  neat  riding  breeches  was  sending  off  in- 
numerable messages — cool,  ubiquitous,  and  busi- 
ness-like, he  inspired  others  to  emulate  him. 

Wonder  of  wonders  !  We  had  been  ashore  only 
six  hours  when  three  wireless  stations  sprang  up 
mushroom-like  on  the  beach,  and  their  buzzing 
sparks  told  the  warships  just  how  and  where  to 
send  their  screaming  missiles.  Troops  continued 
to  land,  and  as  soon  as  they  were  landed  were 
rushed  to  the  firing  line,  usually  to  the  left,  for  the 
right  was  well  held  and  safe  for  the  time. 


20          LIGHT  AND   SHADE   IN  WAR 

At  nightfall  the  bombardment  ceased,  but  Turkish 
shrapnel  burst  over  the  beach  and  the  wounded 
in  the  boats  were  submitted  to  a  hot  shell  fire.  The 
rifle  fire  continued,  nerve-racking  and  noisy.  Sleep 
was  out  of  the  question,  and  trench  digging,  to  con- 
solidate the  position  we  had  won,  commenced  almost 
immediately. 

On  our  left  along  the  beach  about  half  a  mile, 
a  boat,  sunk  in  the  surf,  rocked  uneasily,  With  the 
aid  of  a  glass  I  could  see  its  freight.  Sitting  upright 
were  at  least  eight  dead  men,  and  on  the  beach 
another  twenty.  A  sailor,  distinguishable  by  his 
white  cap  cover,  lay  in  an  attitude  strangely  lifelike, 
his  chin  resting  on  his  hand,  his  face  turned  to  our 
position.  The  next  afternoon  I  casually  turned  my 
glasses  on  the  pathetic  group,  and  saw  that  the  sailor 
was  now  lying  on  his  back  with  his  face  to  the  sky. 
There  was  no  mistake  :  he  had  been  alive,  and 
perhaps  even  now,  after  lying  there  nearly  thirty- 
six  hours,  he  was  still  alive.  I  was  destined  to  get 
yet  another  thrill.  In  the  centre  of  the  heap  on  the 
beach  there  was  some  movement. 

And  then  I  saw  distinctly  a  khaki  cap  waving 
weakly,  and  presently  a  man  detached  himself 
from  the  group  and  hobbled  slowly  towards  us  along 
the  beach.  Immediately  the  snipers  started  afresh. 

Four  other  men  and  myself  made  off  along  the 
beach  to  meet  the  sad  figure,  which  by  this  time 
had  collapsed.  Ten  yards  out  from  our  trench  we 
drew  fire,  and  the  bullets  whispered  confidingly 
"  Duck,"  and  as  they  entered  the  water  or  hit 


THE  LANDING  21 

the  stones  by  our  feet,  "  Run  like  the  devil !  "  I 
personally  cut  out  the  first  hundred  yards  in  well 
under  eleven  seconds,  and  although  my  style  might 
have  been  ragged,  it  was  good  enough  and  got  me 
to  a  small  sandy  knoll  where  I  was  able  to  talk  to  the 
man.  There  were  four  others  still  alive  out  there, 
he  said,  and  "  last  night  there  were  eight,  but  it 
was  cold,  and  they'd  had  no  water  or  food,  and 
couldn't  last  it  out."  That  was  all. 

We  got  him  in  slowly,  and  afterwards  the  others, 
but  not  until  one  of  the  warships  had  dealt  with  the 
snipers.  Later  we  buried  all  the  others.  One  of  the 
men  we  brought  in  had  been  out  there  half  in  the 
water  and  half  out,  shot  through  both  knees,  but 
he  was  cheery  and  bright,  and  asked  first  about  his 
brother  in  another  company,  and  then  explained 
where  the  Turks  were  sniping  from. 

At  night  the  rifle  fire  waved  backwards  and  for- 
wards in  fluctuating  bursts,  and  we  expected  an 
attack  at  dawn.  It  came,  but  not  against  our  posi- 
tion. More  in  the  centre  the  enemy  made  a  des- 
perate effort  They  approached  our  trenches — • 
came  through  the  lines,  and  were  certainly  brave 
and  venturesome.  Once  an  unmistakably  foreign 
bugle  blew  the  "  Cease  fire,"  but  an  order  was 
passed  down  our  line  to  take  no  notice,  it  was  a  ruse. 
At  one  time,  as  darkness  came  down  a  voice  in 
English  called  out  "  Retire  !  Retire  ! "  but  as  there 
was  no  immediate  reason  why  we  should  retire, 
we  waited,  and  again  Brigade  Headquarters  informed 
us  it  was  not  a  British  command. 


22          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

It  will  be  hard  to  forget  those  first  days,  and 
even  now  I  wake  at  night  with  the  patter  of  musketr  y 
in  my  ears,  only  to  find  some  cart  is  rumbling  past 
the  hospital  on  uneasy  wheels. 


ABDUL:   AN  APPRECIATION 

I  HEARD  the  shriek  of  an  approaching  shell, 
something  hit  the  ground  beneath  my  feet, 
and  I  went  sailing  through  the  ether,  to  land  softly 
on  an  iron  hospital  cot  in  a  small  white- walled  room. 
There  was  no  doubt  that  it  was  a  most  extraordinary 
happening.  On  the  wall  beside  me  was  a  tempera- 
ture chart,  on  a  table  by  my  bed  was  a  goolah  of 
water,  and  in  the  air  was  that  subtle  Cairene  smell. 
Yes,  I  was  undoubtedly  back  in  Cairo.  Obviously 
I  must  have  arrived  by  that  shell. 

Then,  as  I  was  thinking  it  all  out,  appeared  to  me 
a  vision  in  a  long  white  galabieh.  It  smiled,  or 
rather  its  mouth  opened,  and  disclosed  a  row  of 
teeth  like  hailstones  on  black  garden  mould, 

"  Me  Abdul,"  it  said  coyly ;  "  gotter  givit  you 
one  wash." 

I  was  washed  in  sections,  and  Abdul  did  it 
thoroughly.  There  came  a  halt  after  some  more 
than  usually  strenuous  scrubbing  at  my  knees.  Mut- 
terings  of  "  mushquais  "  (no  good)  and  a  wrinkled 
brow  showed  me  that  Abdul  was  puzzled.  Then  it 
dawned  on  me.  I  had  been  wearing  shorts  at 

23 


24          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

Anzac,  and  Abdul  was  trying  to  wash  the  sunburn 
off  my  knees !  By  dint  of  bad  French,  worse 
Arabic,  and  much  sign  language  I  explained.  Abdul 
went  to  the  door  and  jodelled  down  the  corridor, 
"  Mohaaaaamed  !  Achmed !  "  Two  other  slaves  of 
the  wash-bowl  appeared,  and  to  them  Abdul  dis- 
closed my  mahogany  knees  with  much  the  same  air 
as  the  gentleman  who  tells  one  the  fine  points  of  the 
living  skeleton  on  Hampstead  Heath.  They  gazed 
in  wonder.  At  last  Achmed  put  his  hand  on  my 
knee.  "  This  called  ?  "  he  asked.  "  Knee,"  I  told 
him. 

"  Yes,"  he  said  thoughtfully,  "  this  neece — 
Arabic  ;  this  "  (pointing  to  an  unsunburnt  part  of 
my  leg)—"  Eengleesh." 

Then  the  washing  proceeded  uninterruptedly. 
"  You  feelin'  very  quais  (good)  ?  "  Abdul  asked.  I 
told  him  I  was  pretty  quais,  but  that  I  had  been 
quaiser.  "  Ginral  comin'  safternoon  and  Missus," 
he  informed  me,  and  I  gathered  that  no  less  a  person 
than  the  Commander-in-Chief  (one  of  them)  was  to 
visit  the  hospital.  And  so  it  happened,  for  about 
five  o'clock  there  was  a  clinking  of  spurs  in  the 
passage,  and  the  matron  ushered  in  an  affable 
brass  hat  and  a  very  charming  lady.  In  the  back- 
ground hovered  several  staff  officers.  Suddenly 
their  ranks  were  burst  asunder  and  Abdul  appeared 
breathless. 

He  had  nearly  missed  the  show.  He  stood  over 
me  with  an  air  of  ownership  and  suddenly  whipped 
off  my  bed-clothes,  displaying  my  nether  limbs. 


ABDUL  :  AN  APPRECIATION  25 

He  saw  he  had  made  an  impression.  "  Neece  is 
Arabic,"  he  said  proudly.  It  was  Abdul's  best 
turn,  and  he  brought  the  house  down.  The  visitors 
departed,  but  for  ten  minutes  I  heard  loud  laughter 
from  down  the  corridor.  Abdul  had  departed  in 
their  wake,  doubtless  to  tell  Achmed  and  Mohammed 
of  the  success  of  his  coup. 

I  had  been  smoking  cigarettes,  but  found  the 
habit  extravagant,  as  Abdul  appreciated  them  even 
more  than  I  did.  One  morning  I  woke  up  to  see 
him  making  a  cache  in  his  round  cotton  cap.  I  kept 
quiet  until  he  came  nearer,  and  then  I  grabbed  his 
hat.  It  was  as  I  thought,  and  about  ten  cigarettes 
rolled  on  the  floor.  I  looked  sternly  at  Abdul. 
He  was  due  to  wither  up  and  confess.  Instead  he 
broke  first  into  a  seraphic  grin  and  then  roared 
with  laughter.  "  Oh,  very  funny,  very,  very 
funny/'  he  said  between  his  paroxysms.  Now  what 
could  I  say  after  that  ?  I  was  beaten  and  I  had 
to  admit  it,  but  I  decided  that  I  would  smoke  a 
pipe.  To  this  end  I  gave  Abdul  ten  piastres  and  sent 
him  out  to  buy  me  some  tobacco.  He  arrived 
back  in  about  an  hour  with  two  tins  worth  each 
eight  piastres.  "  Me  quais  ?  "  he  asked  expectantly. 
"  Well,  you  are  pretty  hot  stuff,"  I  admitted,  "  but 
how  did  you  do  it  ?  " 

Abdul  held  up  one  tin. 

"  Me  buy  this  one,"  he  said  solemnly  ;  "  this 
one  "  (holding  up  the  other  one)  "  got  it !  " 

"  What  do  you  mean,  '  got  it '  ?  " 

"  Jus'  got  it,"  was  all  the  answer  I  could  get. 


26          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

Then  to  crown  the  performance  he  produced  two 
piastres  change.  Could  the  genii  of  the  Arabian 
Nights  have  done  better  ? 

I  was  in  that  hospital  for  three  weeks,  and  I 
verily  believe  that  if  it  had  not  been  for  Abdul  I 
should  have  been  in  three  weeks  more.  He  had 
his  own  way  of  doing  things  and  people,  but  he 
modelled  himself  unconsciously  on  some  personality 
half-way  between  Florence  Nightingale  and  Fagin's 
most  promising  pupil.  The  day  I  was  to  go  he 
cleaned  my  tunic  buttons  and  helmet  badge  with 
my  toothbrush  and  paste  and  brought  them  proudly 
to  me  for  thanks.  And  I  thanked  him. 

The  last  I  saw  of  Abdul  was  as  I  drove  away  in 
the  ambulance.  A  pathetic  figure  in  a  white  robe 
stood  out  on  the  balcony  and  mopped  his  eyes  with 
his  cotton  cap,  and  as  he  took  it  off  his  head  there 
fell  to  the  ground  half  a  dozen  crushed  cigarettes. 
It  was  a  typical  finale. 


TWO  LETTERS 

WELLINGTON,  N.Z., 

TROOPSHIP  No.  10. 

DEAR  JIMMY,— 
We  go  out  into  the  stream  to-morrow 
morning  early,  so  I  am  writing  you  now,  and  will 
post  it  before  we  leave  the  wharf.  Pater  came 
on  board  with  mater  to  say  good-bye  last  night, 
and  I  took  them  over  our  quarters.  Mater  was 
vastly  impressed  with  the  fact  that  we  have  the 
first-class  accommodation  of  the  vessel.  We  have 
our  mess  in  the  huge  saloon,  but  all  the  marble 
panelling  is  covered  over  with  rough  deal  boards 
and  all  the  regular  tables  have  been  taken  out,  and 
we  now  sit  at  boards  that  are  as  rough  as  our  man- 
ners. You  know  we  have  a  mixed  company,  and 
bank  clerks  and  big  run  holders  sit  cheek  by  jowl 
with  shearers  and  roadmen.  All  of  them  are  jolly 
good  fellows  though,  and  all  as  keen  as  mustard 
to  get  away.  Yesterday  I  saw  Henderson,  you 
know  the  chap  who  bought  Wainamu  station  and 
about  thirteen  hundred  cattle,  handing  round  the 
stew  at  the  two  centre  tables,  and  one  of  the  men 
he  was  waiting  on  was  a  chap  who  used  to  be  his 

27 


28          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

polo  groom  !  War  is  a  great  leveller,  and  here  one 
sees  instances  that  seem  almost  laughable.  They 
are  saved  being  that  by  the  fact  that  not  one  man 
amongst  the  whole  force  is  in  the  least  self-conscious. 

I  told  you  we  privates  and  corporals  have  the 
saloon  to  dine  in.  Well,  there's  a  rather  good  joke 
on  the  sergeants.  Their  dining-room  is  the  chil- 
dren's saloon,  and  the  fact  is  blazoned  over  the 
door  in  letters  of  brass  !  Spud  comes  on  to-morrow 
and  takes  the  vacant  bunk  in  the  four-berth  cabin 
we  occupy.  When  we  are  all  in  bed  there's  lots  of 
room,  but  we  all  have  to  get  undressed  in  the  alley 
way,  and  our  clothes  are  wreathed  about  the  room 
like  khaki  draperies. 

The  pater  is  a  funny  old  bird,  isn't  he  ?  When 
he  had  talked  a  bit  to  me  about  keeping  my  nut 
down  when  it  wasn't  wanted  up,  he  said  he  had  a 
lot  of  writing  to  do  for  to-morrow's  English  mail. 
Then  he  shook  hands  rather  hurriedly  and  went 
down  the  gangway  and  along  the  wharf  without 
even  once  looking  back.  His  figure  faded  into  a 
mist  as  he  got  near  the  end,  and  I  had  to  take  a 
pull  on  myself  and  talk  hard  to  mater,  who  had  not 
gone  ashore. 

She  only  had  about  another  ten  minutes  on  board, 
and  we  talked  of  everything  but  war  or  going  away. 
Dear  old  mater  !  She  went  through  my  kit  seriatim, 
and  gave  me  advice  as  to  my  wardrobe  as  if  I  was 
travelling  like  a  prince.  As  a  matter  of  fact  my 
wardrobe  now  consists  of  about  two  shirts  and 
four  pair  of  socks.  Neither  of  us  felt  too  cheery, 


TWO  LETTERS  29 

but  mater  is  the  bravest  little  woman  in  the  world, 
and  she  kissed  me  and  went  down  on  to  the  wharf 
with  the  cheeriest  of  smiles  on  her  face.  She  waited 
for  a  while  at  the  barrier  and  waved.  Kelly  the 
big  wharf  policeman  was  by  me  on  the  deck  and 
took  things  in  at  a  glance.  "  Oi've  an  ould  mother 
mesilf,"  he  said,  "  although  she  is  a  few  thousand 
miles  away  from  here.  Oi'll  just  be  after  seem' 
her  safely  through  the  crowd  now."  And  he  ambled 
off  down  to  the  barrier  and  was  as  good  as  his  word. 
Kelly  made  a  lane  through  the  crowd,  and  the  last 
I  saw  of  them  both  was  when  they  waved  from  the 
corner  of  the  woolstore.  Bless  Kelly  for  the  very 
human  bobby  that  he  is  !  He'd  be  pouring  out 
his  inimitable  stories  until  he  drew  a  smile,  then 
he'd  get  a  laugh,  and  by  the  time  he'd  finished  I 
bet  you  he  sent  mater  home  more  or  less  happy. 
And  now  I'm  off  to  bed.  Second  thoughts,  I'll  keep 
this  letter  and  not  post  it  to-morrow,  for  you'll  see 
all  you  want  in  the  long  letter  I  am  posting  to  pater, 
which  I  will  ask  them  to  send  on  to  you.  I  will 
keep  this  and  add  to  it  and  post  it  from  the  first  port. 

NEXT  DAY. 

Just  a  few  lines  to-day.  Last  night  I  lay  up  on 
the  boat  deck  and  soaked  in  the  glorious  night. 
Somewhere,  on  a  transport  lying  away  over  towards 
Evans  Bay,  a  bugle  sounded  "  First  Post,"  and  one 
by  one  all  the  ships  echoed  the  call.  On  our  fore- 
castle a  man  with  a  violin  was  playing  Raff's  Cava- 
tina,  and  playing  it  like  a  master.  Now  and  again 


30          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

the  whinny  of  a  horse  would  break  into  the  melody 
like  some  strange  obligate.  I  listened  to  these 
sounds  until  "  Last  Post  "  rang  out  from  our  deck 
first,  and  then  blended  in  one  sad  call  as  the  other 
ships  joined  in  as  before.  One  by  one  the  rows  of 
lighted  ports  disappeared,  and  I  went  down  to  bunk 
feeling  something  like  I  did  years  ago  when  I  sat 
in  Big  School  waiting  to  go  in  to  my  last  Com- 
memoration Day  service. 

NEXT  DAY. 

My  head's  in  a  whirl  after  this  most  wonderful 
morning.  We  paraded  early,  and  rumour  for  once 
was  right.  There  was  something  afoot.  One  had 
only  to  look  at  the  warships  to  see  that,  for  they 
had  stowed  their  cutters  and  pinnaces  and  were  in 
sea-going  trim.  At  about  half-past  eight  the  first 
of  our  escort,  the  flagship,  steamed  slowly  out  of  the 
harbour,  and  one  by  one  our  big  grey  transports 
followed,  until  we  brought  up  the  end  of  the  line. 
It  was  a  wonderful  sight,  and  the  few  people  who 
had  the  luck  to  be  about  saw  something  that  they 
will  remember  all  their  lives.  We  went  slowly 
towards  Pencarrow  Light,  and  past  the  beaches 
where  we  used  to  sun-bathe  in  less  stirring  times.  A 
splash  of  white  away  up  on  the  hill  amongst  the 
manuka  scrub  marked  the  house  where  we  spent 
our  week-ends  this  time  last  year.  On  the  other 
side  of  the  harbour  faint  cheers  came  from  shore- 
wards,  and  a  flag  dipped  to  us  as  we  passed  the 
Forts.  On  through  the  rocky  headlands  and  out 


TWO  LETTERS  31 

away  westwards,  past  the  long  white  beaches,  and 
then  the  iron-bound  coast  of  Terawhiti.  The  strait 
was  calm  as  glass,  and  as  the  long  line  of  sixteen 
vessels  swung  out,  the  smoke  from  their  funnels 
towered  in  black  columns  above  them.  The  six 
transports  on  the  starboard  side  slowed  down  (we 
could  hear  the  bells  of  their  engine-room  telegraphs) 
until  the  last  six  of  the  line  came  up  abreast  of 
them.  Then  in  double  file,  with  the  black  signal 
cones  showing  that  they  were  making  "  required 
speed,"  they  forged  slowly  ahead. 

Away  to  starboard,  a  big  grey  cruiser  belched 
black  smoke   (she  burns  oil),  and  the  flag  at  her 
stern  was  the  Rising  Sun  of  Japan. 
EVENING. 

Terawhiti  Head  has  long  ago  faded  into  the  soft 
blue  mist,  and  we  have  left  Farewell  Spit  abeam. 
Never  did  so  many  New  Zealanders  say  farewell  to  it 
before.  Ahead  of  us  the  sky  is  a  blaze  of  crimson 
and  the  soft  smooth  sea  has  absorbed  the  colour 
until  the  horizon  line  almost  fades  away  to  nothing. 
At  first,  an  hour  back,  it  was  a  faint  pink,  but  as  one 
watched,  the  few  clouds  edged  with  rose  took  on  a 
brighter  hue  until  they  reached  a  colour  climax  of 
vivid  crimson.  Even  now  it  is  dying.  Along  the 
deck  the  men  are  cleaning  up  the  horse-stalls,  but 
every  now  and  then  an  energetic  sweeper  pauses 
and  leans  on  his  broom,  looking  his  last  at  the  faint 
line  of  Farewell  Spit.  Perhaps,  who  knows,  we 
may  live  that  moment  over  again  when  we  start 
off  on  our  last  trek. 


32          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

I  was  watching  a  man  leaning  on  the  rail  just 
now  and  he  smiled  slowly,  then  laughed  to  himself. 
Seeing  me,  he  explained :  "I  was  just  thinking  of 
the  last  time  I  came  across  here.  It  was  in  this 
same  old  tub,  and  when  we  got  about  here  I  was 
cussing  a  deck  steward  who  said  he  couldn't  find  me 
a  chair.  That  was  my  bunk  (pointing  to  a  deck 
cabin  used  as  the  Colonel's  office),  and  I  thought  it 
wasn't  as  good  as  it  might  be.  And  here  I  am  muck- 
ing out  stables  and  swabbing  decks,  where  six 
months  ago  I  was  standing  telling  another  passenger 
that  the  Company's  food  seemed  to  be  getting 
worse  and  worse.  Then  we  only  had  a  choice  of 
about  twenty-five  dishes  and  now  a  man  is  safe 
to  make  a  hundred  pound  bet  that  it's  stew  for 
tea.  Well,  it's  all  in  the  game  !  Get  over  there, 
you  swine  !  "  and  he  bent  to  his  work  again  scrub- 
bing the  planking  beneath  the  feet  of  a  large  chestnut 
that  seemed  to  resent  his  attentions. 

There's  "  Cook  House  Door  "  going,  and  as  I  have 
tea  in  the  second  relay  I'd  better  be  off.  I  will 
write  up  mater's  letter  to-night,  but  I  might  add 
to  this  if  I've  anything  for  your  private  ear.  I'll 
post  it  at  the  first  port,  wherever  that  is  to  be. 

So  long  just  now. 

Yours, 

NOEL. 

ZEITOUN  CAMP,  CAIRO. 

DEAR  JIMMY, — 

It  seems  to  me  that  I  have  forgotten  you  for  a 
long  time  past,  but  you  wilThave  seen  all  the  letters 


TWO  LETTERS  33 

to  pater  and  mater.  Still,  our  letters  are  in  the 
nature  of  personal  confabs,  and  as  I  never  give 
you  news  in  the  common  sense  of  the  word,  I  am 
going  to  write  of  things  haphazard.  We  have  come 
the  old,  old  route  of  the  ocean  caravans,  and  are 
here  in  a  city  where  the  centuries  jostle  one  another. 

Past  the  door  of  my  hut  but  five  minutes  gone 
Joseph  led  Mary  on  an  ass,  and  a  racing  taxi  dusted 
the  father's  blue  robe  as  the  lowly  group  drew  aside. 

Over  the  railway  line  at  Matarieh  is  the  Virgin's 
tree,  where  Mary  rested  with  her  babe  in  their 
flight.  Tourists  and  others  visit  the  spot  and 
afterwards  produce  the  inevitable  camera  record, 
saying  to  their  friends,  "  Of  course,  it  is  only  a 
legend."  But  it  is  not.  I  know  better  now,  for  as 
I  watched  a  mother  came  to  the  sakhia  wheel  and 
cupped  her  hands  to  the  water  running  from  the 
pottery  jars.  She  drank  the  cool  draught,  and 
sitting  on  the  stone  well-coping  gave  her  child  to 
drink  also,  crooning  softly  until  her  song  murmured 
like  the  plashing  water  from  the  well-wheel.  And 
the  patient  ox  with  his  wicker  head-stall,  for  all  he 
could  not  see,  knew  as  well  as  I  that  Mary  did  rest 
here. 

Camp  is  camp  all  the  world  over,  but  a  Cairo 
camp  is  surely  like  no  other  on  earth.  We  are  on 
the  boundary  of  Heliopolis,  the  ancient  city  of  On, 
and  at  the  end  of  the  camp  road  one  crosses  a 
patch  of  desert  where  the  people  of  old  time  buried 
their  dead.  The  graves  are  narrow  shafts,  and  two 
days  age  Spud  and  I  explored  a  number  of  them. 


34          LIGHT  AND  SHADE   IN  WAR 

At  the  bottom,  short  stone-lined  galleries  radiate 
to  the  tombs,  all  of  which  have  now  been  despoiled. 
Still,  one  comes  across  an  occasional  scarab,  or  a 
deposit  of  beads  of  some  ancient  dynasty.  Isn't  it 
weird  to  think  where  some  of  these  may  find  their 
way  ?  Back  in  New  Zealand  or  Australia,  the 
ornaments  of  an  Egyptian  princess  may  become 
sacred  souvenirs  of  a  life  given  for  the  Empire. 

Since  I  have  been  here  I  have  got  the  deuce  of  a 
respect  for  our  camp  cooks.  It  is  easy  enough  to 
get  sand  in  the  food,  but  it  must  take  brains  to  turn 
out  a  stew  that  resembles  nothing  so  much  as  slabs 
from  an  'asphalt  tennis-court  soaked  in  gravy.  If 
the  Israelites  had  half  as  bad  a  time  as  we  are 
having  with  the  sand  then  we  cannot  wonder  at 
their  clearing  out.  The  thing  that  surprises  me  is 
that  when  they  got  to  the  Red  Sea  they  wanted 
to  walk  across  on  dry  land  at  all.  I  should  have 
thought  that  they  would  have  said,  "  Thanks,  but 
we  would  be  glad  of  the  chance  to  swim." 

We  eke  out  our  meals  with  a  vegetarian  diet.  It 
sometimes  takes  so  long  to  bargain  for  and  buy  a 
cucumber  and  half  a  dozen  tomatoes  that  we  have 
to  take  our  lunch  on  parade  in  our  haversacks.  A 
plate  of  tomatoes  and  cucumber  garnished  with 
onion  makes  a  very  acceptable  meal  when  the  ther- 
mometer stands  at  over  the  century. 

Spud  and  I  went  to  the  citadel  last  night,  and  sat 
on  the  battlements  where  Napoleon  mounted  his 
guns .  It  was  j  ust  getting  dusk,  and  all  the  sordidness 
of  the  city  was  veiled  with  a  soft  violet  haze  through 


TWO  LETTERS  35 

which  the  minarets  of  the  mosques  showed  hesitat- 
ingly. Over  west  past  the  river,  the  sun  set  behind 
the  Pyramids.  It  is  only  thus  that  one  gets  any 
idea  of  their  size.  The  muezzin  came  out  on  to  the 
minaret  of  a  near-by  mosque,  and  with  his  hands 
held  trumpet-wise  called  the  faithful  to  prayer. 
The  wonderful  notes  rose  and  fell,  infinitely  sad, 
with  rippling  syllables  and  alliteration. 

Then  from  the  battlements  below  us,  now  shrouded 
in  darkness,  came  words  of  command.  With  start- 
ling suddenness  the  garrison  bugles  rang  out  "  re- 
treat," all  their  harshness  mellowed  by  the  soft 
warm  air.  To  our  left  through  the  gloom  stood  a 
sentry,  and  as  we  watched  we  seemed  to  see  the 
cocked  hat,  the  long  white  spatterdashes,  and  the 
clumsy  musket  of  an  age  gone  by.  He  came  nearer 
and  I  heard  him  sigh  for  his  home  in  France,  and 
then  I  caught  the  murmur,  "  Pour  la  Patrie." 

But  it  was  just  a  Tommy,  commonplace  and 
unromantic,  but  even  in  him  the  spirit  of  the  old 
days  still  lives.  And  so  I  think  it  does  with  us. 
There  are  rumours  about  that  we  have  a  move  in 
prospect,  and  we  may  soon  get  out  of  this  stagnant 
backwater  into  the  full-flowing  stream  that  may 
lead  us  God  knows  where. 

Yours  as  ever  was, 

NOEL. 


IN  THE  TRACK  OF  THE  TROOPS 

APRIL,  1915. 

A  VOYAGE  westward  and  northward  across  the 
oceans  from  the  Antipodes  in  these  times 
impresses  the  traveller  not  only  with  the  vast  re- 
sources of  the  Empire,  but  also  with  the  splendid 
spirit  that  animates  our  race  in  a  crisis  calling  for 
almost  superhuman  energies  of  mind  and  body. 
Every  one  now  knows  what  the  Colonies  have  volun- 
tarily done,  and  are  still  prepared  to  do.  That  is 
one  of  the  many  issues  upon  which  German  diplomats 
blundered  hopelessly  On  the  great  liner  carrying 
His  Majesty's  mails  to  the  heart  of  the  Empire  we 
soon  find  that  almost  every  man — and  woman — is 
travelling  to  or  because  of  the  war.  Each  is  going 
in  the  track  of  the  troops  that  have  gone  before. 
Albany,  where  months  ago  the  great  Australasian 
armada  assembled  for  its  historic  voyage,  is  the  first 
milestone  along  the  route.  There  are  others  that 
mark  historic  stages  in  the  great  trek — the  rusting 
ribs  of  the  Emden  upon  the  Keeling  rocks  ;  the  huge 
camps  in  the  desert  in  Egypt ;  the  fight  on  the 
Canal ;  and  now  the  operations  in  the  Dardanelles. 
History  is  being  "  written  in  lightning  flashes." 

36 


IN  THE  TRACK  OF  THE  TROOPS      37 

And  there  will  be  other  milestones  yet,  farther  afield. 
At  Fremantle,  a  splendid  New  Zealand  ship, 
crowded  with  Australian  soldiers,  their  band  playing, 
steams  into  the  golden  wake  of  the  setting  sun. 
It  is  an  inspiriting  scene.  The  enthusiasm  spreads 
to  the  passengers  on  the  liner,  and  the  flying  corps 
in  the  well  deck  for'ard  join  in  the  lusty  cheering, 
and  then  burst  into  a  song  with  the  refrain — 

We  will  never  forget  Australia 
And  the  friends  we  leave  behind. 

The  crude  poetry  of  the  song  will  not  find  a  place 
in  any  anthology,  but  the  sentiment  appeals  to  the 
dwellers  in  the  great  sun-baked  Continent,  which 
already,  almost,  has  become  a  nation. 

The  Aviation  Corps,  which  consists  of  a  young 
captain,  a  young  lieutenant,  and  some  thirty-eight 
non-coms,  and  men,  is  keen  as  possible.  Drill, 
study,  and  physical  exercises  occupy  nearly  all  their 
time.  They  are  a  fine  type  of  young  men  who 
compose  this  corps.  One  of  the  "  Tommies  "  owns 
two  large  sheep  stations,  and  is  rich  beyond  the 
dreams  of  avarice.  He  could  buy  up  the  ship,  cargo 
and  all ;  but  he  wanted  to  do  his  share  in  the  war, 
and,  knowing  nothing  of  drill,  decided  to  join  as  a 
private.  "  And,"  says  the  stout  farrier  sergeant- 
major,  who  wears  the  ribbon  of  the  Boer  War,  "  he 
is  as  happy  as  Larry."  The  corps  does  not  know 
where  it  is  going ;  but  it  imagines  it  will  soon  be 
operating  in  the  Persian  Gulf. 

There  are  quite  a  number  of  young  men  on  board, 


38          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

all  bound  for  one  or  other  of  the  campaigns  in  which 
Britain  is  now  engaged.  Two  go  Home  to  join 
King  Edward's  Horse.  Two  others  hope  for  com- 
missions in  the  Engineers.  Then  there  are  several 
young  doctors,  fresh  from  their  final  examinations 
— among  them  the  fast  bowler  of  an  Australian 
eleven.  They  are,  without  exception,  fine  types 
of  the  young  Australian,  and  will  give  of  their  best 
in  the  cause  of  the  Empire.  There  are  also  English 
officers  on  furlough,  now  keen  to  get  to  the  war. 
The  tall,  clever  cavalryman  at  the  captain's  table 
has  already  been  there.  A  horse  fell  with  him, 
and  he  was  sent  on  a  special  mission,  with  two  other 
officers,  to  buy  horses  in  Australia — twenty  thou- 
sand of  them.  It  is  a  game  at  which  in  the  past  big 
commissions  have  been  made,  but  of  late  years  the 
methods  of  the  War  Office  have  been  revolutionized, 
and  so  it  happens  that  the  only  tribute  in  connexion 
with  this  £400,000  deal  is  a  box  of  somewhat  inferior 
cigars  pushed  on  board  a  departing  steamer  by  a 
man  in  Adelaide,  and,  in  addition,  a  glowing  letter 
of  praise  from  an  officer  high  up  in  the  Army  Re- 
mount Department. 

An  ex-P.  and  O.  officer,  R.N.R.,  who  already  has 
had  eight  cousins  killed  in  the  war,  has  left  his  sheep 
station  in  Australia  to  do  duty  in  the  North  Sea. 
His  wife  and  two  babies  are  with  him.  A  captain, 
who  saw  service  with  the  New  Zealanders  in  the  Boer 
War,  and  who  has  since  roughed  it  in  the  "  Mallee," 
is  returning  to  join  his  old  regiment,  the  Buffs — 
or  what  is  left  of  it. 


IN  THE  TRACK  OF  THE  TROOPS   39 

Ten  days  out  from  Fremantle  the  flashing  of  the 
Galle  light,  and,  later,  a  flaming  sunrise  above  the 
cone  of  Adams's  Peak,  point  to  other  scenes — to 
Ceylon,  which,  out  of  her  four  thousand  planters, 
has  sent  three  thousand  to  the  war.  At  Colombo, 
except  for  the  scarcity  of  freightships  and  the 
dearth  of  tourists,  it  is  a  case  of  "  business  as  usual," 
for  there  is  nqw  no  Emden  afloat  and  no  Ceylon 
Germans  wirelessing  to  her  about  the  movements 
of  British  ships.  The  Galle  Face  at  dinner  is  still 
an  interesting  sight,  and  here  meet  and  mingle  men 
from  New  Zealand  and  Australia,  from  Penang  and 
Singapore,  from  Hong- Kong  and  Yokohama,  even 
from  Petrograd  and  Peking.  A  chance  meeting  with 
an  old  friend  leads  to  a  dinner  at  the  G.O.H.  in  in- 
teresting company.  A  clever  Russian  official  and  a 
young  Russian  from  Siberia  are  able  to  tell  us 
much  about  the  Eastern  campaign  and  to  give 
comprehensive  details  of  the  great  driving  force 
in  the  Tsar's  dominions.  Russia  can  train  twelve 
million  men  for  this  war.  The  figures  are  stagger- 
ing. "  But  has  she  enough  munitions  for  her 
present  forces  ?  "  We  are  assured  that  she  is 
getting  them.  England  has  helped,  so  has  Japan, 
and  even  America. 

Colombo  is  the  jumping-off  place  for  our  outposts 
of  Empire  in  the  Far  East — those  possessions  and 
dependencies  in  which  the  young  men  who  are  the 
pioneers  of  tropic  trade  stew  and  swelter  in  the  hot, 
moist  ports,  or  toil  in  the  fever-stricken  jungles 
with  tin  and  rubber.  There  are  men  boarding  our 


40          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

ship  from  all  these  parts  bound  for  the  war.  Many 
have  already  gone  on.  The  Straits  Settlements, 
especially,  have  done  splendidly,  both  in  regard  to 
men  and  money.  These  people  tell  strange  tales 
of  happenings  in  the  Far  East — the  Singapore  riot, 
a  jumpy  time  at  Hong-Kong,  and  other  events. 
The  German  who  engineered  the  riot  at  Singapore 
was  head  of  a  big  firm  there.  He  escaped  to  Java, 
and  from  there  had  the  impudence  to  telegraph 
back  to  the  Governor  thanking  him  for  his  hos- 
pitality ! 

In  Colombo,  also,  one  hears  strange  tales  of 
German  spies.  One  of  the  German  firms  was  the 
wealthiest  in  Colombo.  The  German  Club  was  the 
best  there.  The  former  re  now  being  conducted 
by  the  Government.  The  latter  is  closed,  and, 
as  we  drive  through  the  residential  quarter,  we  note 
the  shuttered  houses  of  these  wealthy  Germans 
standing  untenanted  and  forlorn  amidst  the  gorgeous 
flowering  trees  and  shrubs  of  their  spacious  grounds. 
Their  former  inhabitants  are  in  an  inland  camp  under 
strict  guard.  The  late  manager  of  the  Galle  Face 
and  the  wealthy  merchant  are  among  them.  Hagen- 
back — brother  of  the  celebrated  animal  man — was 
caught  red-handed  sending  messages.  Owing  to 
some  laxity  he  is  supposed  to  have  escaped  to  Java. 
Rumour  states  that  a  British  cruiser  went  after 
him.  What  happened  is  known  to  few  people.  A 
police  official  hints  that  he  did  not  reach  Java.  Some 
say  he  was  shot.  After  the  war  we  may  know. 

From  all  one  hears  of  the  happenings  in  the  Far 


IN  THE  TRACK  OF  THE  TROOPS  41 

East  one  comes  to  the  inevitable  conclusion  that 
the  authorities  throughout  the  British  Dominions 
cannot  be  too  strict  in  their  treatment  of  the  German 
alien  within  their  gates.  In  some  instances  there 
was  undue  tolerance,  and  precautions  were  taken 
only  when  it  was  too  late.  It  all  points  to  the 
necessity  for  the  appointment  of  strong  and  capable 
men  to  important  positions  of  great  trust  in  the 
outposts  of  Empire.  Such  positions  should  not  be 
simply  rewards  for  political  services  rendered  or 
money  given  to  a  cause. 

It  is  interesting  to  listen  to  the  opinions  of  men 
and  women  who  have  seen  the  troops  on  their  way 
to  the  seat  of  war.  But  this  is  scarcely  a  time  for 
comparisons  and  criticisms.  On  the  contrary,  so 
tremendous  is  the  task  before  us  that  it  behoves 
every  one  to  do  all  that  is  possible  by  word  and  act 
in  stimulating  a  friendly  feeling  and  a  healthy 
patriotism.  One  could  not,  however,  repress  a 
thrill  of  pride  in  listening  to  the  opinions  of  the 
people  of  Colombo  upon  the  conduct  and  bearing 
of  the  New  Zealand  troops  who  landed  there.  The 
New  Zealanders  wherever  they  have  been  have 
maintained  untarnished  the  fair  name  of  their  fine 
country.  All  that  one  has  heard  in  the  track  of 
our  troops  is  a  tribute  to  the  care  with  which  they 
were  selected,  to  the  officers  who  trained  them,  and 
to  the  stock  from  which  they  have  sprung.  The 
moral  of  it  all  is  to  weed  out  the  waster,  to  discard 
the  unfit.  As  time  goes  on  and  more  drafts  are  re- 
quired this  may  be  the  more  difficult  of  accomplish- 


42          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

ment,    but    it   will   be    none    the    less    necessary. 

Among  the  men  who  joined  us  at  Colombo  from 
the  Far  East  was  a  young  Belgian  Consul.  Several 
of  his  relatives  and  many  of  his  friends  have  fallen 
in  the  war.  He  is  going  to  the  trenches.  His 
mother,  who  is  in  Brussels,  wrote  that,  though  he 
was  an  only  son,  he  must  come  home  and  fight. 
Willingly  he  has  left  his  post  in  the  East,  and  is 
hurrying  to  the  Western  battlefields. 

As  our  voyage  proceeds  it  becomes  more  and 
more  interesting,  though  somewhat  more  risky.  In 
the  Arabian  Sea  the  south-west  monsoon  drives  us 
north  of  the  long  barren  island  of  Socotra,  and  we 
reach  Aden  late.  Still  later  in  the  night  the  Salsette 
glides  in,  bringing  her  load  of  Anglo-Indians,  with 
piles  of  luggage,  in  which  one  notes  the  guns  of  the 
hunter,  the  rods  of  the  masheer  man,  and  the  clubs 
of  the  less  adventurous  golfer.  The  stout  little  old 
man  with  the  eyeglass  is  a  general  from  the  Persian 
Gulf.  Next  him,  diving  into  the  pile  of  luggage  for 
his  bundle,  is  a  sergeant  of  the  Royal  Horse  Artillery. 
He  is  here  with  some  twenty  or  thirty  of  his  men 
from  India  going  to  train  more  artillery  in  England. 
He  is  not  troubling  much  about  the  war.  War  is 
his  job,  and  he  will  take  it  as  and  when  it  comes 
with  the  calm  philosophy  of  his  type.  Meantime, 
it  is  the  necessity  of  the  moment  that  he  is  thinking 
about,  and  he  delivers  with  much  metaphor  and 
appropriate  adjectives  a  homily  to  all  and  sundry 
upon  the  blighter  who  has  "  pinched  "  his  straps. 
A  grey  cruiser  from  the  Persian  Gulf  has  poked 


IN  THE  TRACK  OF  THE  TROOPS  43 

her  nose  in  under  the  shelter  of  the  old  rock,  and  as 
the  shore  searchlights  pierce  the  darkness  this  ship, 
and  other  craft  of  varied  kind,  are  revealed  with 
startling  suddenness.  On  shore  the  garrison  is 
strengthened,  and  big  Sikh  sentries  bar  your  pro- 
gress on  the  upland  paths. 

Perim,  with  its  lighthouse  and  its  cable  station, 
stares  at  us  as  we  enter  the  Red  Sea.  Here  are 
more  soldiers.  They  were  needed.  All  that  night 
the  lights  along  the  Red  Sea,  formerly  in  the  hands 
of  the  Turks,  now  tended  by  British  hands,  flash 
brightly.  Here  we  meet  and  pass  the  converging 
traffic  of  East  and  West — a  tank  steamer  with 
engines  far  aft,  carrying  oil  from  Java  ;  a  hospital 
ship  going  to  the  Persian  Gulf ;  a  Dutch  steamer 
with  her  colours  and  name  in  huge  letters  so  that 
the  German  submarines  may  not  sink  her  ;  and  many 
others,  all  travelling  in  comparative  safety  under 
the  protecting  wing  of  the  British  Navy. 

The  Canal  is  a  sight  in  itself,  Port  Said  is  more 
interesting  than  ever,  and  Alexandria  provides 
scenes  never  to  be  forgotten.  We  have  come  these 
thousands  of  miles  in  the  track  of  the  troops  unes- 
corted and  without  a  mishap,  with  never  a  German 
flag  in  sight — a  tribute  surely  to  the  nation  that 
still  rules  the  waves.  And  throughout  this  long 
trek  across  the  oceans,  at  every  port  men  are  joining 
us  eager  to  take  their  places  in  the  fighting  lines. 
From  the  fertile  fields  of  New  Zealand,  from  the 
sun-bathed  plains  of  Australia,  from  China,  from 
India,  from  Ceylon,  from  the  Malay  Archipelago, 


44          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN   WAR 

and  even  from  Somaliland,  the  young  men  are 
answering  the  call,  with  the  blood  of  their  fathers 
still  strong  in  their  veins.  They  are  travelling 
westward  in  the  track  of  the  troops  who  have  gone 
before. 


THE  GROUND  WE  WON 

GALLIPOLI, 
AUGUST  16,  1915. 

IT  is  after  the  fight.  The  battle  has  spent  itself 
as  a  breaker  on  a  rock-bound  shore.  The  back- 
wash is  gathering  itself  slowly  together  to  form 
another  wave.  It  is  a  good  opportunity  to  make  a 
pilgrimage  to  the  shrine  of  our  dead :  to  see  the 
ground  so  dearly  won.  There  is  still  desultory 
firing  from  the  guns  on  the  cruisers  and  destroyers 
in  the  Gulf  of  Saros,  the  waters  of  which  lave  our 
curving  sandy  beach  opposite  Imbros  and  that 
other  rugged  isle  where  St.  Paul  sailed.  The  crack 
of  an  enemy  maxim  resounds  from  the  hillside, 
and  the  stream  of  bullets  hits  up  the  sand  on  the 
beach.  At  intervals — intervals  long  enough  to 
suggest  a  scarcity  of  high  explosives — a  shell  from 
a  big  Turkish  gun  bursts  in  the  sand  or  the  sea. 
Sometimes,  too  tired  to  fight,  it  doesn't  even  burst. 
A  sniper,  who  is  more  than  a  good  shot,  amuses 
himself  potting  from  long  range  at  some  Indians 
digging  a  grave. 

We  turn  our  backs  on  all  this  and  enter  a  trench 
45 


46          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

on  our  left.  The  sap  bends  round  on  to  a  little 
flat  and  leads  into  the  mouth  of  a  narrow  valley, 
up  which  winds  a  path  flanked  by  scrub-covered 
low  ridges.  At  first  the  grade  is  easy.  On  the  left 
the  sad  grey  of  olive  trees  contrasts  with  the  green 
of  the  ilex — the  prickly  dwarf  oak  that  covers  this 
rugged  country.  How  our  men  fought  through 
here  in  the  darkness  is  a  marvel.  The  prickly 
scrub  tore  their  hands  and  bare  knees  till  there 
was  not  an  inch  of  skin  unscarified.  For  three 
terrible  days  they  continued  fighting,  and  then 
sores  that  had  become  septic  gave  the  doctors  much 
work.  Wandering  a  little  way  into  the  scrub  at 
the  risk  of  being  sniped  you  note  the  evidences  of  the 
advance — bits  of  torn  garments,  a  puttee  that  had 
become  loosened  and  torn  from  the  leg,  a  helmet 
lost  in  the  darkness,  a  sock  telling  the  tale  of  a 
wounded  foot,  other  garments  blood-stained,  clips 
of  cartridges,  a  broken  rifle,  and  first  field  dressings 
torn  from  arm  or  leg  by  the  unyielding  branches 
of  the  sturdy  prickly  ilex.  In  some  of  the  most 
beautiful  spots  the  stench  of  an  unburied  body 
fouls  the  hot  air.  On  the  left  is  an  old  Turkish 
well,  the  coping  blown  off  by  some  shell.  It  is  deep 
and  narrow,  and  lined  with  stone.  Most  likely  there 
is  a  body  at  the  bottom  of  it. 

On  the  left,  also,  is  a  barbed-wire  entanglement, 
with  which  the  enemy  hoped  to  block  the  progress 
up  the  valley.  The  troops  went  at  it  under  fire  in 
the  darkness.  With  clippers  they  cut  the  wire, 
and,  this  being  too  slow  a  process,  by  main  strength 


THE  GROUND  WE  WON  47 

they  tore  up  the  stakes.  Not  a  man  was  killed  ! 
The  bullets  went  flying  over  their  heads  with  one 
continuous  screech. 

"  I  tink  we  all  get  killed  at  that  wire/'  said  one 
Maori.  "  The  bullets  come  ping  !  ping  !  ping  ! 
over  our  heads  all  the  time  ;  but  the  Turk  he  fire 
too  high.  Py  gorry  !  I  tink  we  have  the  lucky 
escape  that  time  !  " 

Later  in  the  night  the  Maoris  had  still  more  serious 
work  to  do.  In  silence,  with  empty  magazines  and 
fixed  bayonets'they  attacked  the  Turk  in  trench  and 
dug-out,  helping  to  clear  the  scrub-covered  foot- 
hills for  the  main  attack  on  Chunuk  Bair.  They 
were  supposed  to  do  all  this  in  silence,  but,  after 
the  first  brush,  the  blood  was  up,  and,  for  the  first 
time  in  history,  the  hills  and  dales  of  Gallipoli  re- 
sounded to  the  ancient  war-song  of  the  Maori 
tribesmen — 

Ka  mate,  ka  mate  ! 

Ka  ora,  ka  ora  I 

Ka  mate,  ka  mate  ! 

Ka  ora,  ka  ora  ! 

Tene  te  tangata  puhuruhuru, 

Nana  te  tangata  puhuruhuru, 

Nana  i  tiki  mai  whakawhiti  te  ra, 

Upane,  kaupene,  upane  kaupane  ; 

Whiti  te  ra  !  * 

followed  by  British  cheering.  No  one  could  see  what 
was  taking  place,  but  we  on  the  hills  below,  listen- 
ing, and  watching  the  flashes  of  the  Turkish  guns, 
could  picture  the  scene.  A  few  minutes  of  deathly 
silence,  then  a  burst  of  cheering  and  the"  Kamate, 


48  LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

ka  mate  !  "  again.  Then  silence  once  more  and 
renewed  cheering  and  the  war-song,  as  the  warriors 
dashed  forward  bayoneting  right  and  left,  or 
clubbing  as  with  the  "  taiaha  "  of  the  olden  time. 
In  this  way  trench  after  trench  was  cleared.  Above 
the  rattle  of  the  Turkish  musketry  and  cries  of 
"  Allah  !  Allah  !  "  the  shouts  of  victory  in  the 
darkness  made  a  thrilling  prelude  to  the  main  battle 
that  was  to  begin  at  dawn.  But  these  brave  war- 
riors did  not  escape  scatheless  themselves,  for 
many  a  Maori  of  noble  lineage  lay  dead  that  night 
amidst  the  ilex  shrubbery  on  the  slopes  above  the 
Gulf  of  Saros. 

Shot  through  the  body,  one  young  brave  fell 
on  a  path  at  the  bottom  of  the  ravine.  He  blocked 
the  way  for  the  stretcher-bearers  and  the  ammunition 
and  water-carriers.  So  they  rolled  the  body  some 
few  yards  up  the  hillside.  "  Poor  old  Hori,"  they 
said,  "  he's  finished,"  and  they  left  him  and  pressed 
on.  But  Hori  took  it  into  his  head  to  come  to  life 
again,  and,  after  the  first  few  dazed  minutes,  he  got 
up  and  walked  down  to  the  dressing-station  ! 

At  one  spot  on  our  upward  journey  the  track  is 
overlooked  by  the  Turkish  trenches.  We  can  see 
them  quite  clearly  on  the  slopes  of  Chunuk  Bair, 
and  there  are  snipers  who  have  come  down  into  the 
scrub  to  take  pot-shots  at  men  passing  up  and  down 
the  valley.  It  becomes  necessary  to  run.  Sand- 
bags are  piled  high  at  intervals,  and  we  dash  from 
one  barricade  to  another  in  fifty  and  hundred-yard 
sprints.  Cowering  under  the  first  wall  of  sand- 


THE  GROUND  WE  WON  49 

bags,  very  much  out  of  breath,  we  look  at  each  other 
and  laugh.  My  sprinting  days  are  almost  over,  and 
in  such  a  grilling  heat  one  would  almost  prefer  the 
risk  of  being  shot.  My  companion — a  famous 
English  war  correspondent — having  regained  his 
wind,  remarks,  "I'm  not  very  fond  of  bullets,  but  I 
do  hate  running."  Then  we  make  another  dash  up 
to  the  next  lot  of  sandbags,  and  fling  ourselves  at 
their  base.  It  is  really  too  ridiculous,  and  we  look 
at  each  other  and  laugh  louder  than  before.  Here 
there  are  half  a  dozen  "  Tommies  "  who  are  in  the 
middle  of  the  same  performance.  One  points  to  a 
stone  almost  touching  my  foot.  "  He  got  one  on  to 
that  stone  just  now,"  he  said  in  a  Lancashire  dialect. 
I  drew  in  my  leg  quickly — I  am  brave  only  when  I 
am  fairly  safe,  or  when  enthusiasm  or  necessity  un- 
latches the  door  of  discretion  !  "  Three  sergeants 
were  talking  to  one  another  at  that  bend  this  morn- 
ing, and  every  one  was  hit,"  said  another  man. 
He  seemed  to  regard  this  as  a  joke.  If  one  only  had 
been  hit  that  would  have  been  an  ordinary  occur- 
rence, and  not  worth  mention.  But  a  bag  of 
three  ! — that  was  too  funny  for  words.  While  we 
had  been  doing  the  last  sprint  it  had  occurred  to 
each  of  us  that  we  would  walk  the  next  stage,  but 
we  now  resolved  to  run  harder  than  ever  !  After 
four  or  five  successive  sprints  of  this  kind  we  were 
glad  to  moisten  our  parched  throats  with  some 
precious  water  at  a  field  dressing-station  of  the 
1 3th  Division  that  we  ran  into  round  a  bend  of  the 
track  higher  up. 

E 


50          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

The  steep  spurs  and  precipitous  sides  of  "  Table 
Top  "  were  now  on  our  right,  and  one  marvelled 
how  our  men  had  got  up  there  in  the  darkness. 
The  Turks  had  bolted  from  Table  Top  !  Half  a 
dozen  could  have  held  the  position  against  our  men- 
coming  up  in  single  file.  But  we  had  another  bit 
of  luck  here.  No  sooner  had  our  men  gained  the 
position  than  150  Turks,  driven  out  of  one  of  their 
forward  positions  by  the  New  Zealanders,  attempted 
to  scale  the  heights.  Other  New  Zealanders  were 
on  them  in  an  instant,  and  recognizing  their  position 
was  wellnigh  hopeless,  they  all  laid  down  their 
arms  and  surrendered.  Our  men  took  158  Turkish 
prisoners  here. 

The  track  winds  and  twists  and  gets  steeper. 
A  mule-train  laden  with  ammunition  and  stores 
passes,  and  the  protruding  boxes  in  the  narrow  way 
threaten  us  with  broken  ribs.  The  steep  hills  have 
now  closed  in  on  us  and  we  are  safe  from  snipers. 
Far  below,  the  gloriously  blue  and  placid  waters  of 
the  Gulf  of  Saros  come  into  view.  Up,  up,  up  we 
climb.  Our  men  had  no  track  here — naught  but 
steep  hillside,  dense  prickly  scrub,  and  Turkish 
bullets.  We  wonder  more  than  ever  how  they 
stormed  the  position.  The  English  correspondent 
who  has  seen  much  war  becomes  enthusiastic.  We 
have  a  few  words  with  the  Brigadier-General,  whose 
attacking  column  is  now  resting.  This  Brigade- 
Major  is  sitting  with  bandaged  knees  in  the  same 
dug-out. 

The    view   becomes   more   extensive   and   more 


THE   GROUND   WE  WON  51 

beautiful  as  we  climb.  Presently  we  are  in  the 
trenches — the  highest  trenches  we  now  hold  on 
Rhododendron  Ridge — the  highest  on  all  the  Penin- 
sula. The  ridge  itself  is  strewn  with  bodies,  swollen 
and  festering  in  the  hot  sun.  No  man  dare  go  out 
to  bury  them.  Some  are  in  strange  attitudes,  but 
mostly  they  have  fallen  forward  on  their  faces, 
suggesting  "  the  stout  heart  to  the  stae  brae." 
Quite  close  are  a  New  Zealander  and  a  Ghurka  ; 
farther  along  the  ridge  a  Turk  ;  and,  yonder,  three 
men  fallen  together.  Near  one  trench  is  part  of  a 
body  that  high  explosive  has  dismembered.  Some  of 
these  are  among  the  "  missing."  They  may  never 
be  identified  ;  they  will  occupy  a  common  nameless 
grave  on  Rhododendron  Spur,  far  from  their  homes 
in  Mother  England,  in  sunny  Australia,  in  distant 
New  Zealand,  and  among  the  hills  of  India.  In  the 
cleft  of  the  summit  hill  away  on  the  left  is  a  heavy 
toll  of  Turkish  dead. 

The  men  now  occupying  the  position  are  living  in 
little  dug-outs  just  below  us.  They  take  turns  in  the 
trenches.  The  Turks  in  front  have  sapped  forward 
and  have  made  a  short  trench  facing  us  about  fifty 
yards  away.  One  shows  his  head  above  the  top, 
and  in  an  instant  the  machine  gun  at  our  elbow  is 
spitting  at  him,  each  crack  making  a  puissant 
throbbing  in  our  ears,  while  the  stream  of  bullets 
hits  up  the  opposing  parapet  in  dust.  The  cracking 
and  the  throbbing  cease,  and  when  the  dust  has 
cleared  there  is  no  more  sign  of  the  Turk's  head. 
Whether  there  is  a  bullet  through  it  or  not  we  can- 


52          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

not  say,  but  if  not  it  has  been  a  very  close  call  for 
that  particular  Turk. 

An  officer  comes  along  and  tells  us  we  must  be 
out  of  the  trenches  by  five  o'clock.  The  guns  are 
going  to  bombard,  he  adds,  and  there  may  be  a  few 
"  shorts."  We  have  no  desire  to  be  involved  in 
shells  bursting  short,  so  make  the  best  use  of  the 
four  minutes  left  us  and  depart.  As  we  round  a 
corner  in  the  trench  a  Turk  throws  a  bomb,  and  a 
"  Tommy,"  endeavouring  to  throw  it  back,  has  his 
right  hand  blown  clean  off.  A  ligature  and  bandage 
are  quickly  applied,  and  later  in  the  evening  he 
passes  on  a  stretcher  carried  down  the  winding  path 
on  his  way  to  England.  He  has  seen  the  last  of  the 
great  war.  Looking  back  to  the  still  figures  on  the 
spur  of  Rhododendron  Ridge  one  cannot  help  think- 
ing that  he  is  a  lucky  man. 

We  wait  awhile  to  take  some  photographs  and 
to  watch  the  bombardment.  Then  back  down  the 
steep  path  between  the  stunted  ilex.  Men  are 
ducking  into  their  dug-outs.  A  Turkish  machine 
gun  from  the  left  is  hitting  up  the  dust  on  the  track. 
We  cut  out  a  hundred  yards  in  quick  time  between 
two  bursts  of  fire,  and  escape  unhit.  All  this  is  at 
the  end  of  a  long  and  tiring  day,  that  commenced 
at  Imbros  at  5  a.m.,  included  a  trip  across  the  Gulf 
of  Saros,  a  call  at  Suvla,  a  sea  trip  along  the  coast  to 
Anzac,  and  a  walk  back  along  the  hot,  dusty  sap  to 
our  new  position.  After  this  other  pilgrimage  bully 
beef  and  hard  biscuit  and  tea,  and  the  writing  of 
dispatches  till  midnight.  Then  the  interests  and 


GRAVKS  ox  GALLIPOT. i. 


THE  LAST  LOAD. 


THE  GROUND  WE  WON  53 

incidents  and  issues  of  war,  ever  in  our  minds,  are 
effaced  by  welcome  slumber,  that  not  even  the  noise 
of  battle  can  disturb. 

*  Death  is  done 
And  life  is  come  ! 

Behold  the  illustrious  chief  of  power 
To  whom  we  owe  this  light  ome  hour  ! 
He  stays  with  us  an  honoured  while  : 
All  evil  flies  before  his  smile. 


THE     EDGE     OF     THE     BARLEY 
FIELD 

ON  A  DAY  IN  AUGUST,  1915 

MY  DEAREST  ONE, — 
I  have  been  back  to  the  Barley  Field. 
Yesterday  I  felt  as  if  I  could  never  go  there  again — 
but  yesterday  was  a  red  day.  This  morning  only 
a  few  of  the  guns  were  talking.  The  sun  was  bright 
and  hot ;  but  there  was  a  gentle  land  breeze.  The 
sea  was  calm,  and  blue  as  a  sapphire.  Save  for  the 
tremulous  whistle  overhead  of  a  sixty-pounder 
from  a  howitzer  at  lengthy  intervals,  the  occasional 
crack  of  a  sniper's  rifle,  and  a  few  staccato  shots 
from  a  concealed  maxim,  the  whole  Peninsula 
seemed  at  peace.  I  went  round  by  the  fringe  of 
the  low  grass-lands,  between  the  sturdy,  forlorn 
oaks  and  graceful,  whispering  olive  trees.  The 
tender  silver  grey  of  these  olive  groves  often  con- 
ceals a  gun — indeed  a  whole  battery  !  Can  you 
imagine  a  greater  incongruity  ? 

You  come  suddenly  round  a  bend,  upon  a  clump 
of  these  trees,  and  expect  to  hear  a  thrush,  or  at 

54 


THE  EDGE  OF  THE  BARLEY   FIELD  55 

least  a  linnet,  sing.  What  you  do  hear  is  a  man 
with  a  telephone  tied  to  his  ear,  calling  mechanically 
from  long  custom :  "  Twenty  minutes  more  right  ! 
Add  twenty-five  !  Repeat  !  "  That  has  come  along 
the  wire  from  an  observation  post  a  mile  or  more 
away,  and  is  passed  on  to  an  officer,  who  in  turn 
tells  it  to  the  gun's  crew,  and  notes  the  entry  in 
a  book.  He  is  seated  on  an  empty  ammunition- 
box  and,  apparently,  is  taking  little  interest  in  the 
proceedings.  Why  should  he  ?  He  cannot  see  the 
result  of  his  work.  Neither  can  the  man  who  fires 
the  gun.  One  regiment  may  be  gallantly  storming 
the  heights  or  another  hurriedly  legging  it  from  a 
captured  trench,  yet  the  gunner  will  not  see  the 
glory  of  the  one  nor  the  tragedy  of  the  other.  The 
shell  is  put  into  the  gun,  the  breech  closed,  the 
sights  quickly  adjusted,  and  there  is  a  resonant 
bang  as  the  shell  goes  tearing  through  the  air 
toward  the  unseen  trench  or  gun  emplacement. 
War  is  now  a  strange  mixture  of  highly  complex 
machinery  and  the  ruder  instruments  of  a  bygone 
age. 

But  I  have  forgotten  about  the  Barley  Field, 
and  I  have  forgotten  also  that  it  was  not  to  you 
that  I  wrote  about  it.  It  was  yesterday  that  we 
came  upon  it.  There  were  three  of  us.  It  was  the 
Colonel  who,  on  rounding  a  bend  in  the  sap,  suddenly 
said:  "  Oh,  hell !  here's  the  General."  The  Colonel 
was  not  supposed  to  go  near  a  battle — he  was  a  Q 
man.  But  he  did  want  to  see  this  fight.  So  did  the 
others,  so  with  one  accord  we  scrambled  out  of  the 


56          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

sap  and  over  an  ilex-covered  ridge,  close  under  the 
whistling  shells.  In  this  way  we  dodged  the 
General.  We  descended  again  into  a  valley,  ran 
across  an  open  flat,  with  the  bullets  whipping  the 
dust  all  around  us,  climbed  on  to  another  ridge, 
and  lay  prone  watching  the  battle.  There  was  an 
inferno  of  noise.  The  shells  were  shrieking  over- 
head like  infuriated  demons  of  the  air  ;  the  machine 
guns  were  rapping  out  their  death-dealing  tattoo  ; 
and  the  short,  sharp-nosed  Turkish  bullets  were 
coming  with  an  almost  continuous  whistle,  as  of  a 
strong  wind  on  overhead  wires,  and  phut-phutting 
into  the  ground  all  about  us.  Spread  below  us, 
within  full  view,  the  battle  raged,  the  Turkish 
trenches  going  up  in  clouds  with  the  shell  smoke. 
Men  were  going  forward  and  coming  back,  and  all 
the  time  the  whip  of  the  shrapnel  and  the  stream 
and  shower  of  machine  gun  and  rifle  fire  were  making 
the  attacking  numbers  smaller.  Fires  started  in 
the  grass  and  scrub,  and  many  wounded  lying  out 
there  that  night  were  burnt  to  death. 

The  elation  of  watching /the  opening  phases  of  a 
battle  at  close  range  can  never  be  forgotten.  But 
that  feeling  does  not  continue,  even  with  success, 
and  after  a  time  you  note  that  while  ammunition 
and  water  are  being  hurried  forward,  the  wounded 
are  already  coming  slowly  back — some  gamely 
walking,  others,  with  ghastly  head  and  body 
wounds,  lying  quietly  on  the  stretchers  bravely 
borne  by  the  sweating  bearers.  Some  few  are 
sneaking  back  from  the  stricken  field,  themselves 


THE  EDGE  OF  THE  BARLEY  FIELD     57 

untouched,  with  wounded  comrades  :  some  with 
wounds  self-inflicted.  Even  such  things  happen  in 
battle  ! 

But  to-day  there  was  none  of  this  grim  work.  The 
Peninsula  seemed  almost  at  peace.  We  had  gained 
ground  and  were  digging  in  :  the  enemy  had  lost 
ground  and  were  also  digging  in. 

Crossing  the  valley  at  the  foot  of  the  ilex-covered 
ridge  from  which  we  viewed  the  fighting  yesterday, 
one  saw  that  the  big  oak-tree,  under  which  we  had 
sheltered  awhile,  had  got  some  more  bullets  through 
its  rough  skin.  And  one  wondered  whether  some 
Christian  carpenter — with  St.  Sophia  redeemed  at 
last  from  the  Crescent — building  anew,  might  per- 
chance blunt  his  plane  on  this  Turkish  nickel,  and 
use  unchristian  language.  But  we  had  to  confess 
to  some  doubt,  for  Turkish  trenches  had  grown  like 
mushrooms  in  a  night,  and  we  could  plainly  see, 
from  the  edge  of  the  Barley  Field,  that  here  history 
was  not  being  written  "  in  lightning  flashes." 

For  two  reasons  I  had  gone  back  to  the  Barley 
Field :  I  wanted  to  get  away  from  the  moaning 
that,  at  intervals,  came  from  the  rude  shelter  where 
our  wounded  lay  in  rows  in  the  hot  sun.  I  wished 
to  get  away  also  from  the  flies  and  the  sight  of 
blood  ;  and  from  the  dead  men  sewn  up,  each  in  his 
own  grey  blanket,  ready  for  the  long  sleep  in  his 
hurriedly  dug  grave.  Those  who  die  here,  near 
where  I  write  crouching  in  a  small,  sandy,  fly-filled 
dug-out,  get  formal  burial.  Farther  afield  their 
comrades,  who  with  the  enemy  dead  block  the  taken 


58          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

trenches,  are  covered  where  they  lie.  The  trench 
that  was  to  become  their  home  becomes  their  grave. 
Friend  and  foe  they  lie  together — in  peace  at  last. 
May  God  and  the  Prophet  keep  their  respective 
souls  and  send  consolation  to  their  bereaved.  Dying 
in  the  same  trench,  they  have  bandaged  each  other's 
wounds,  have  slaked  each  other's  thirst.  May 
each  in  his  own  paradise  have  his  due  reward  for 
such  kindly  deeds  ! 

Beside  the  Barley  Field  to-day,  one  is  away  from 
all  the  strife  and  the  sordid  side  of  war.  Even  the 
partridges  that  we  flushed  yesterday  have  come 
back  into  the  corn,  for  a  partridge  as  well  as  a 
soldier  does  well  to  have  a  full  crop  in  these  times 
of  harry  and  strife.  As  I  came  upon  them  they 
rose  with  a  whirr  of  wings  from  beside  a  bandolier 
on  the  edge  of  the  trodden  corn,  and  now,  as 
yesterday,  when  the  battle  was  at  its  height,  they 
flew  across  the  ridge  toward  the  Turkish  lines. 

Lying  here  on  the  warm  earth,  on  the  fringe  of 
what  was  the  battlefield,  one  gains  time  and  quiet 
to  think  over  things.  The  sordid  side  of  war  is 
often  uppermost  in  one's  thought.  But  there  are 
golden  streaks  in  the  darkness,  or  perhaps  one  should 
say  in  the  redness,  were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  even 
the  crimson  stain  on  unshaven  face  and  torn,  brown 
garment  dries  a  duller  hue — as  unpleasant  to  look 
upon  as  the  flies  that  swarm  about  it. 

But  here  in  this  clear  air,  the  unfathomable 
blue  above,  one  looks  rather  on  the  golden  lining 
to  the  cloud,  and  closing  my  eyes  in  the  hot  noon 


THE  EDGE  OF  THE  BARLEY  FIELD    59 

beside  the  Barley  Field,  I  picture  the  long  procession 
of  our  noble  dead. 

From  the  lands  of  all  our  great  Empire  men  have 
rallied  to  the  call.  Brave  General,  gallant  Colonel, 
fearless  private — each  alike  has  won  his  guerdon 
in  the  Great  Event.  There  are  mental  silhouettes 
of  one's  own  friends  that  death  alone  can  efface — 
a  gallant  Colonel  charging  over  the  crest  of  a  great 
ridge  in  the  dawn  ;  a  doctor  who  at  his  years  might 
well  have  been  taking  his  ease  in  England,  shot 
through  the  head  in  his  bivouac ;  a  brave  man 
killed  after  victory  in  a  dashing  bayonet  charge 
in  the  dark  ;  surgeons  and  stretcher-bearers  ;  padres 
and  engineers  ;  signallers  and  soldiers,  one  after 
another  they  pass  in  the  great  procession. 

For  myself,  I  think  this  war,  if  it  has  not  come 
too  late,  has  come  only  just  in  time  to  save  England. 
A  great  prosperity  and  a  long  peace  were  leading 
the  nation  slowly  but  surely  toward  a  carelessness 
if  not  a  disastrous  decadence  almost  inevitable 
under  such  circumstances.  Yet  whether  we  win  or 
lose  or  the  battle  be  a  drawn  one,  I  firmly  believe 
that  the  treasure  which  has  been  spent  and  the 
blood  which  has  been  spilt  will  not  have  been  spent 
or  spilt  in  vain.  In  regard  to  this  particular  cam- 
paign we  see  that  in  the  Parliament  and  in  the  Press 
of  England  the  slowly  receding  tide  of  unwarranted 
jubilation  is  giving  place  to  an  onrushing  wave  of 
gloom.  Yet  would  one  fain  believe  that  underlying 
this,  instead  of  a  floor  of  shifting  sand,  there  is  still 
a  stratum  of  solid  purpose  and  idealism  that  will 


60          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

make  itself  felt,  and  that  whatever  happens  to  us 
the  better  part  of  the  nation  will  never  admit  that 
a  single  soldier  has  died  here  in  vain. 

There  is  a  paragraph  of  Ruskin's — at  the  time  of 
Balaclava — in  which  you  might  alter  only  one  word 
and  apply  it  here. 

"  But  I  ask  their  witness,"  he  says,  "  to  whom  the 
war  has  changed  the  aspect  of  the  earth,  and  imagery 
of  heaven,  whose  hopes  it  has  cut  off  like  a  spider's 
web,  whose  treasure  it  has  placed,  in  a  moment, 
under  the  seals  of  clay.  Those  who  can  never  more 
see  sunrise,  nor  watch  the  climbing  light  gild  the 
eastern  clouds,  without  thinking  what  graves  it  has 
gilded,  first,  far  down  behind  the  dark  earth-line — 
who  never  more  shall  see  the  crocus  bloom  in  spring, 
without  thinking  what  dust  it  is  that  feeds  the  wild- 
flowers  of  Gallipoli.  Ask  their  witness,  and  see  if 
they  will  not  reply  that  it  is  well  with  them  and 
with  theirs  ;  that  they  would  have  it  not  otherwise  ; 
would  not,  if  they  might,  receive  back  their  gifts 
of  love  and  life,  nor  take  again  the  purple  of  their 
blood  out  of  the  cross  on  the  breastplate  of  England. 
Ask  them :  and  though  they  should  answer  only 
with  a  sob,  listen  if  it  does  not  gather  upon  their  lips 
into  the  sound  of  the  old  Seyton  war-cry — '  Set 
on  I '  " 

With  all  my  love, 

Yours, 

M. 


ON  THE  FRINGES  OF  WAR 


comes  a  time  in  most  military  operations 
A  nowadays  when  equal  opposing  armies, 
however  bravely  they  fight,  must  halt  to  draw 
breath.  That  time  is  utilized  by  them  in  the  gentle 
art  of  "  consolidating  the  position."  Such  a  stage 
was  reached  in  September  in  the  Gallipoli  campaign, 
and  it  was  evident  that  there  would  be  a  dull  week 
or  two  for  the  War  Correspondents.  It  occurred  to 
them  that,  in  such  circumstances,  the  fringes  of  the 
invaded  country  might  prove  even  more  interesting 
than  the  battle-ground  itself,  so  one  fine  morning 
they  set  out  down  the  ^Egean  for  the  picturesque 
and  interesting  Island  of  Mytilene. 

Certain  it  was  that  among  the  islands  of  the  ^Egean, 
and  along  the  coast  of  Asia  —  almost,  though  not 
quite,  within  sound  of  our  guns  —  events  of  historic 
interest  that  went  unrecorded  were  happening. 
The  splendid  work  of  our  Navy  in  these  waters 
would  alone  make  a  glowing  page  in  history.  But, 
alas  !  the  chroniclers  of  the  Navy  are  so  full  of 
modesty  that  many  a  deed  of  derring  do  will  never 
be  told  as  it  should  be. 

For  a  time  the  presence  of  enemy  submarines 
61 


62  LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

seemed  to  send  the  ships  of  the  Allied  fleets  scurrying 
for  security  into  boomed  harbours,  but  it  was  soon 
evident  that  the  German  submarines  could  no  more 
chase  the  British  flag  from  the  Turkish  seas  than 
they  could  clear  the  Atlantic  or  the  Channel.  In  an 
unsuspected  harbour  or  in  the  lee  of  some  island 
you  came  suddenly  upon  battleship,  cruiser,  monitor, 
or  destroyer — or  perhaps  all  four — held  in  leash 
against  the  opportune  moment,  whenever  it  should 
arrive.  Other  ships  by  day  and  by  night  ploughed 
the  placid  seas,  keeping  watch  and  ward — for  the 
Navy  never  sleeps.  On  "  their  lawful  occasions," 
too,  vessels,  at  anchor  or  slowly  steaming  up 
and  down  the  coast,  woke  the  echoes  with  the 
leisurely  thunder  of  their  great  guns  or  the  more 
insistent  banging  of  their  secondary  armament. 
Their  shells  still  exploded  on  Achi  Baba  ;  in  the 
Anzac  zone  you  might  still  see  bits  of  the  Turkish 
trenches  disappearing  in  clouds  of  high  explosive  ; 
and  from  Suvla  Bay  you  could  note  the  shrapnel 
bursting  over  the  reinforcements  coming  up  to  join 
the  hard-pressed  but  stubborn  Turkish  army  in  front 
of  the  village  of  Biyuik  Anafarta.  Anon  there 
rose  the  deeper  diapason  of  the  bigger  shells, 
ponderously  tearing  a  pathway  through  the  air 
over  the  Peninsula  hills  and  across  the  Dardanelles, 
to  land  with  a  dull  boom  on  the  Asiatic  coast. 
And  then  there  was  the  work  of  our  own  sub- 
marines— daring,  brilliant,  effective — a  story  half 
untold,  but  already  sufficient  to  thrill  the  most 
phlegmatic  pulse.  Some  ships-  and  submarines, 


ON  THE  FRINGES  OF  WAR  63 

it  was  true,  had  disappeared  for  ever  beneath  the 
waters  of  the  gulf  and  of  the  Dardanelles,  but  there 
were  always  others  to  take  their  place,  and  so  it  was 
to  the  end.  Meantime,  in  a  small  yacht  or  a  North 
Sea  trawler,  you  could  steam  unmolested  under 
the  British  flag  along  the  coast  of  Asia,  south  past 
Tenedos  and  other  islands,  on  to  Mytilene.  At 
the  former  a  shell  from  a  monitor  went  rumbling 
overhead  in  search  of  some  Turkish  battery  on  the 
continent,  and  in  reply  a  Turkish  shell  sent  up  a 
spout  of  water  off  the  rocky  island  where  the  monitor 
lay.  In  parts  where  the  waters  narrow  we  steamed 
very  near  the  Turkish  coast — near  enough  to  see 
two  women  walking  on  the  beach  below  a  deserted 
village  with  an  old  rectangular  fort,  built  by  the 
Venetians  or  the  Genoese.  But  we  did  not  go  too 
close,  because  at  any  point  we  might  be  within 
reach  of  the  bullets  of  the  Turkish  coast  patrols, 
who  kept  watch  as  far  south  as  and  even  beyond 
Smyrna. 

The  rugged  hills  of  Asia  rise  steeply  or  in  gentle 
slopes  from  the  water's  edge,  and  in  places  great 
dykes  of  volcanic  rock  cut  across  their  shoulders  or 
crown  their  crests.  The  soil  is  poor,  and,  for  the 
most  part,  too  steep  and  rocky  for  successful  culti- 
vation. Here  and  there  a  grove  of  olives  and  a 
few  slender  poplars  relieve  the  monotony  of  sombre 
scrub,  and  the  yellow  pasture  of  a  dry,  spent  summer. 

On  the  other  side  historic  Mytilene,  where  "  burn- 
ing Sappho  loved  and  sang,"  lifts  its  high,  rocky 
hills  above  slopes  and  bays,  where  nestle  pretty 


64          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

Greek  villages.  The  whole  island  seems  fringed 
with  olive  groves.  Fronting  the  beautiful  bay, 
its  shops  and  caf  6s  and  villas  reflected  in  the  waters 
of  the  curving  harbour,  and  backed  by  rocky  hills, 
up  which  the  olive  groves  climb,  lies  the  capital — the 
old  castle  and  fort  crowning  a  promontory  on  the 
left,  a  still  older  crumbling  ruin  on  the  beach  below. 
To  this  place,  in  their  thousands  and  scores  of 
thousands,  have  come  the  refugees  from  the  coast  of 
Asia,  only  a  few  miles  away,  presenting  a  serious 
problem  for  the  local  authorities  and  for  the  Greek 
Government.  The  exodus  began  before  the  war — 
in  May  and  June  of  1914 — and  continued  until  the 
island,  which  nominally  supports  a  population  of 
about  120,000,  had  80,000  additional  people  cast 
upon  it.  The  exodus,  says  a  refugee,  is  the  direct 
result  of  the  policy  and  action  of  "  the  Committee 
of  Union  and  Progress,"  established  by  the  Young 
Turkish  Party.  The  villages  along  the  coast  are 
essentially  Greek  villages,  but  the  Young  Turk 
Party  was  in  want  of  money,  so,  under  the  guise 
of  Ottomanizing  the  Greeks,  it  commenced  to  levy 
toll.  It  began  by  pretending  to  make  soldiers  of 
these  people,  but  instead  of  calling  upon  "  three 
ages,"  as  in  the  case  of  their  own  people,  it  called 
up  many  more.  The  Greeks  soon  found  that  this 
making  of  them  into  soldiers  was  a  mere  pretence. 
The  Turkish  Government  did  not,  at  that  time, 
want  more  soldiers.  What  it  wanted  was  money, 
and  ever  more  money.  In  accordance  with  this 
policy  the  Greek  recruits  were  not  really  trained 


ON  THE  FRINGES  OF  WAR          65 

as  soldiers,  but  were  given  rough  work — such  as 
road-making — to  do,  the  alternative  being  that 
the  Greeks  would  either  buy  their  freedom  by 
individual  payments  of  £40  or  would  leave  the 
country,  in  which  latter  case  their  property  would 
be  confiscated  by  the  Turkish  Government.  Of  the 
three  things — serving  as  so-called  soldiers,  buying 
their  freedom,  or  leaving  the  country  and  their 
property — the  Greeks  who  came  within  the  scope 
of  the  proclamation  generally  chose  the  last,  and 
so  the  migration  to  Mytilene  began. 

From  Aivali,  with  30,000  inhabitants,  and  all  the 
villages  to  Smyrna,  and  even  farther  south,  the 
exodus  continued,  till  at  one  time  there  must  have 
been  80,000  refugees  in  Mytilene.  Since  then  some 
of  these  had  extended  their  migration  to  Salonika, 
Macedonia,  Kavalla,  and  Piraeus.  In  the  villages 
in  Asia  Minor,  whence  these  migrants  had  come, 
there  were  only  old  men  and  women  and  boys  left. 
What  was  happening  to  them  no  one  knew,  for  the 
father  or  the  son  on  Mytilene  dare  not  return  to  the 
continent.  Communication  between  the  island  and 
the  mainland  was  stopped,  unless  by  some  brigand 
or  by  some  spy,  risking  a  venture  under  cover  of  the 
darkness.  For  it  was  not  only  the  Greek  peasant 
who  had  come  to  the  island  from  the  continent. 
In  the  capital  you  might  hear  the  report  of  a  revolver 
in  the  night-time,  and  German  gold  was  at  work 
there  as  elsewhere.  But  so  long  as  the  olives  were 
yet  to  gather  the  remaining  population  of  the  coastal 
villages  would  not  be  maltreated,  though  they 


66          LIGHT  AND   SHADE   IN  WAR 

might  be  half  starved.  One  did  not  like  to  speculate 
upon  what  might  happen  when  winter  came.  Even 
in  Mytilene,  where  the  Greek  Government  made  an 
allowance  of  six  francs  a  month  per  head,  one  saw 
whole  families  sleeping  in  the  streets,  or  camped, 
with  all  their  little  lares  and  penates  done  up  in  a 
bundle,  under  some  olive  tree  by  the  wayside.  In 
Asia  Minor  the  flocks  and  the  herds  and  the  houses, 
both  of  Greeks  and  Armenians,  had  been  taken. 
After  the  picking  of  the  olives  it  might  be  the  turn 
of  the  women  and  children  to  be  taken.  Many  had 
already  disappeared. 

A  young  lace-maker,  brought  into  the  house 
of  a  friend,  had  a  sad  story  to  tell.  The  old  serving 
woman  had  sadder  tales.  At  the  soup-kitchen 
where  an  English  journalist  was  providing  a  dinner 
for  refugee  children,  there  was  a  pretty  dark-eyed 
girl  of  nine  or  ten,  fending  for  herself  and  her  baby 
sister — the  sole  survivors  of  a  family.  What  had 
happened  to  the  others  she  did  not  know.  Many 
of  these  refugees,  now  in  poverty,  were  a  few  months 
ago  well-to-do.  The  young  Greek,  of  quiet  and 
charming  manner — married  to  an  Englishwoman  of 
a  family  that  had  been  in  Turkey  for  about  two 
hundred  years,  and  through  whose  efforts  this 
soup-kitchen  was  maintained — had,  on  the  way 
thither,  watched  the  smoke  of  his  burning  estate 
rising  across  the  straits.  On  the  mainland  he 
occupied  the  position  almost  of  a  feudal  baron, 
taking  an  interest  in  the  welfare  of  the  peasantry, 
their  churches,  and  their  institutions.  But  he,  like 


ON  THE  FRINGES  OF  WAR  67 

the  others,  had  to  seek  refuge  in  the  neighbouring 
island.  One  had  been  told  stories  of  massacre 
that  one  did  not  believe — such  as  the  body  of  a  girl 
having  been  hung  up  in  a  butcher's  shop,  and  pieces 
of  flesh  cut  off  and  thrown  at  the  passing  Christians. 
This  man  said  witnesses  of  the  incident  could  be 
produced.  He  brought  in  one  whose  friends  and 
relatives  saw  it.  That  was  the  nearest  we  could 
get  to  the  truth.  But  of  rapine  and  murder,  done 
in  the  broad  light  of  day  in  the  highways  and  by- 
ways, there  were  tales  in  plenty,  and  they  were  true 
tales.  Actual  photographs  bore  witness  of  such. 
It  might  be  that  one  side  was  no  more  blameworthy 
than  the  other :  that  it  was  six  of  one  and  half  a 
dozen  of  the  other — that  one  day  the  Turk  did  the 
massacring  and  another  day  the  so-called  Christian. 
Even  our  friend  who  was  succouring  these  Greeks — 
who  were  Turkish  subjects — did  not  blame  the 
Turks  altogether.  He  said  they  were  instigated  by 
others.  Among  the  women  gathered  about  the 
soup-kitchen  was  one  who  saw  many  of  the  foul 
deeds  done  on  the  opposite  coast.  By  disguising 
herself  as  an  old  woman,  she  escaped  notice,  and 
secured  her  own  safety,  while  her  friends  and  rela- 
tions were  butchered  or  carried  off  to  Turkish  houses. 
Many  girls  were  taken  into  the  interior,  and  their 
fate  and  whereabouts  were  still  unknown. 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC 

ANY  one  who  lives  through  the  great  war 
will  have  in  the  years  to  come  precious 
memories  of  the  habitations  in  which  he  has  hoped 
and  feared  and  endured.  The  recollections  will 
not  be  all  pleasant  ones,  yet  the  shadows  will  serve 
only  to  heighten  the  high  lights  that  illumine  the 
picture. 

It  seems  a  long  time  now  since  we  steamed,  with 
lights  out,  past  the  Cyclades  and  the  Sporades  and 
entered  the  blue  ^Egean.  At  Lemnos  we  changed 
from  troopship  to  trawler, — a  premonition  of  the 
transition  from  Shepheard's  in  Cairo  to  a  Dug-out 
on  Gallipoli ! 

Imbros,  a  long  silver-grey  shadow,  appeared 
out  of  the  moonlight  that  paved  our  wake  with 
burnished  silver.  Then,  glowing  like  fire-flies  in  a 
forest,  came  the  lights  of  Anzac,  and  with  them  the 
desultory  crackle  of  rifle  fire,  the  dull  boom  of 
bombs,  and  the  loud  reports  of  a  destroyer's  guns. 
We  landed  in  the  darkness — for  the  moon  had  gone 
down  into  the  Sea  of  Saros — and  a  cloaked  figure 
with  a  lantern  led  us  to  two  small  caverns  in  a  pile 

68 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC. 


ABODES   OF  AN  ANZAC  69 

of  stores.  In  our  clothes  we  laid  ourselves  down 
and  tried  to  sleep,  but  rats  and  a  combined  and 
overpowering  odour  of  cheese  and  tarpaulin  soon 
shifted  us  into  an  "  office."  I  went  to  bed  on  the 
office  table,  safe  at  least  from  the  rats.  As  dawn 
slowly  came  the  walls  resolved  themselves  into  a 
mosaic  of  boxes  with  a  decorative  stencilling  of 
"  Biscuits,  40  Ibs."  on  each  one.  Shadowy  patches 
on  the  tarpaulin  roof  turned  to  constellations  of 
sleeping  flies  that  were  presently  to  awake  to  a 
superactivity  that  made  life  in  the  daytime  almost 
unendurable.  In  the  morning  I  moved  up  to 
"Wellington  Terrace,"  where  the  New  Zealand 
General  had  his  primitive  and  rather  unsafe  head- 
quarters, and  the  next  night  I  slept  the  sleep  of  the 
just  and  the  tired  on  the  open  pathway  that  led 
past  the  bivouacs  and  on  up  to  the  heights  of  Anzac. 
Among  others  I  was  introduced  to  a  member  of  the 
House  of  Commons,  who  set  two  Turkish  prisoners 
to  dig  me  a  dug-out  next  to  his  own. 

They  were  good  fellows,  those  Turks,  and  they 
made  me  an  excellent  dug-out  in  the  side  of  the  hill. 
It  had  two  rafters  supporting  a  galvanized  iron  roof. 
And  it  had  a  door  hung  with  a  grey  blanket,  and  a 
little  window  across  which  was  stretched  some 
netting  to  keep  out  the  flies.  A  ledge  of  hard 
clay  was  for  many  weeks  my  bed,  and,  hard  as  it  was, 
I  became  quite  used  to  it  after  about  a  week,  in 
which  I  got  a  new  idea  of  anatomy — especially  of  the 
hip  joints.  The  corrugated  iron  roof  was  covered 
with  gravelly  clay  that  was  supposed  to  withstand 


70          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

shrapnel  and  dropping  bullets,  but  that  was  an 
illusion  that  lasted  not  many  days.  Sandbags 
would  have  served  the  purpose,  but  there  were 
not  half  enough  sandbags  for  the  men  in  the 
trenches.  For  the  rest  the  roof  kept  out  most  of 
the  rain,  and,  beyond  the  Indian  bury  ing-ground 
in  the  immediate  foreground,  one  never  tired  of  the 
glorious  views  of  Imbros  and  Samothrace  set  in  the 
silver  ^Egean.  Many  a  time  one  seemed  to  earn  the 
Victoria  Cross  going  to  and  from  that  dug-out,  but  I 
was  never  hit,  save  by  flying  stones  and  dirt  from 
bursting  shells.  These  came  from  three  directions 
— the  Anafarta  gun  on  the  left,  our  friend  "  Beachy 
Bill"  on  the  right,  and,  latterly,  from  a  howitzer 
that  lobbed  shells  over  the  hill  from  behind.  Never- 
theless, when  the  time  came  to  move  on,  it  was 
with  a  pang  of  sincere  regret  that  I  left  my  first 
dug-out.  And  though  other  occupants  came  into 
it  and  improved  it  when  material  became  more 
plentiful,  I  could  seldom  pass  it  without  a  longing 
to  go  inside. 

It  was  in  that  August  when  there  was  much 
bloody  fighting  that  we  moved  out  with  the  New 
Zealand  Division  to  No.  2  Outpost  from  which  we 
had  to  make  the  attack  on  the  left.  There,  in  an 
Otago  Colonel,  I  met  an  old  friend.  It  was  the 
night  of  the  commencement  of  the  great  battle 
and  the  Suvla  landing.  In  front  of  his  dug-out 
we  sat  long  in  the  darkness  talking.  And  when  he 
buckled  on  his  harness  and  went  out  into  the  night 
for  the  last  time  he  presented  me  with  his  dug-out. 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  71 

Next  morning  I  saw  him  in  the  Casualty  Clearing 
Station  mortally  wounded.  He  was  conscious  but 
could  not  speak,  yet  when  he  heard  my  name 
mentioned  he  looked  round  at  me,  and  the  old 
pleasant  smile  that  his  friends  and  his  men  knew 
so  well  lit  up  his  face  for  the  last  time. 

Of  that  dug-out  I  have  no  happy  memories.  It 
comes  to  me  in  my  dreams  sometimes  as  a  night- 
mare. It  is  the  darkest  shadow  in  the  whole 
picture.  But  for  weeks  I  lived  and  worked  in  it, 
suffering  my  share  of  illness  and  pestilence.  It  is 
from  that  dug-out  that  I  date  the  loss  of  relatives 
and  friends.  Men  were  killed  and  wounded  all 
about  it.  Not  a  day  passed  without  some  casualty 
occurring  in  the  immediate  vicinity.  In  the  dug- 
out just  behind  it,  another  colonel,  whose  close 
friendship  I  had  made  at  Anzac,  fell  dead  shot 
through  the  head  while  talking  to  a  friend.  A  hard- 
working Peer  of  the  Realm  was  wounded  while 
walking  near  the  Hospital.  My  own  servant  was 
shot  through  the  legs.  And  so  it  went  on  for  weeks 
and  weeks. 

k  One  might  have  made  quite  a  safe  dug-out  in 
that  hillside  by  digging,  but  somehow  one  never 
thought  of  doing  so.  Funk-holes  in  those  days 
were  not  de  rigueur,  and  there  was  always  at  the  back 
of  one's  head  an  idea  that  it  would  not  be  sporting 
to  dig  into  greater  safety  than  one's  neighbour. 
The  General  was  just  as  bad  as  the  rest  of  us.  He 
took  all  the  risks,  and,  in  addition,  no  one  could  keep 
him  out  of  the  trenches. 


72          LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

When  I  went  to  bed  in  my  dug-out  my  head  and 
my  body  were  safe  from  dropping  bullets,  but  not 
my  legs.  One  shell  dropping  in  the  right  place 
would  have  blown  me  and  my  bivouac  out  of  exist- 
ence. And  this,  mind  you,  was  at  Divisional 
Headquarters.  In  France  during  the  battle  of  the 
Somme  one  visited  the  Headquarters  of  a  famous 
Division  that  was  in  the  thick  of  the  fight,  and  was 
made  welcome  in  the  dining-room  of  a  great  chateau 
with  a  walled  garden  and  beautiful  grounds,  beyond 
the  reach  not  only  of  bullets  but  of  shells.  Four  or 
five  miles  from  the  firing-line,  the  contrast  with  our 
circumscribed  area  on  Gallipoli  could  not  fail  to 
strike  home. 

In  this  new  dug-out  there  was  not  room  to  stand 
up,  let  alone  to  indulge  in  the  proverbial  exercise 
of  swinging  a  cat.  So  I  had  to  do  my  writing  sitting 
on  the  floor,  with  my  back  against  one  wall  and  my 
feet  pushed  into  a  little  recess  scooped  out  of  the 
opposite  wall  with  my  pocket-knife.  Only  a  few 
yards  away  was  the  Casualty  Clearing  Station,  and 
while  I  wrote  of  battles  I  had  to  listen  to  the  moaning 
of  the  wounded  and  the  dying.  And  in  the  mornings 
"  the  sour  damp  smell  of  death "  pervaded  my 
dwelling,  for  just  below  the  mouth  of  my  little 
cavern,  laid  out  in  a  row,  with  their  grey  blankets 
over  them,  were  those  who  had  died  in  the  night 
and  were  awaiting  burial.  In  such  a  situation  it 
was  hard  to  get  used  to  the  plague  of  innumerable 
flies,  that,  as  soon  as  the  sun  rose,  began  to  fill 
one's  dug  out.  Poor  food,  thirst,  heat,  dust,  flies, 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  73 

dysentery  and  jaundice  were  the  constant  companions 
of  those  who  lived  here. 

My  friend  the  Member  of  Parliament  went  away 
sick,  and,  seeing  my  plight,  gave  me  his  dug-out 
during  his  absence.  It  was  in  a  small  fort  on  top 
of  a  little  hill,  and  in  comparison  with  my  little  cave 
was  quite  a  palace.  It  had  a  galvanized  iron  roof, 
a  camp  bed,  and  a  small  library.  About  it  was  a 
maze  of  deep  trenches,  some  of  them  originally 
made  by  the  Turks.  One  wall  and  one  end  of  my 
new  dug-out  was  of  hard  clay,  the  other  wall  and 
the  other  end  were  built  up  of  sandbags.  A  piece 
of  mosquito  netting,  hung  in  front  of  the  door,  kept 
out  most  of  the  flies,  but  it  was  cooler  up  here,  and 
there  were  no  dead  except  those  that  were  already 
buried,  so  the  flies  were  fewer.  The  book-case  was 
an  ammunition-box.  It  seemed  strange  in  this 
place,  the  dug-out  of  an  English  M.P.,  to  read  in  his 
Iliad  of  how  in  ancient  days,  not  far  from  here — 

The  sacred  soil  of  Ilios  was  rent 

With  shaft  and  pit ;    foiled  waters  wandering  slow 
Through  plains  where  Simois  and  Scamander  went 

To  war  with  gods  and  heroes  long  ago. 

The  little  fort  was  well  within  reach  of  the  Turkish 
shells,  and  even  of  their  machine  guns  and  rifles. 
There  was  one  sniper  who  used  to  fire  continuously 
at  the  sandbagged  end  of  the  dug-out.  The  phut ! 
phut !  phut  !  of  his  bullets  came  with  an  irritating 
regularity.  Weeks  afterwards  when  the  M.P.  came 
back  I  told  him  to  beware  of  this  persistent  fellow, 
as  I  felt  that  he  would  succeed  in  boring  a  hole 


74          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

right  through  the  wall.  And  sure  enough  he  did,  for 
one  day  my  friend  found  one  of  the  sharp-pointed 
Turkish  bullets  on  the  floor  in  front  of  his  bed. 

This  dug-out  had  many  advantages,  but  one 
serious  drawback.  Only  a  few  yards  away  was  a 
concealed  mountain  gun  that  banged  off  at  the 
first  streak  of  dawn  and  at  other  uncertain  intervals. 
It  was  bad  enough  to  be  unceremoniously  awakened 
out  of  one's  beauty  sleep  in  this  way,  but  in  addition 
I  was  always  in  mortal  terror  that  the  Turks  would 
locate  that  gun  and  land  a  high  explosive  shell 
into  the  fort,  in  which  case  I  should  read  no  more 
in  the  Iliad. 

It  was  an  uncanny  place  in  which  to  sleep,  for 
one  had  no  immediate  neighbours,  and  the  situation 
produced  a  new  sensation  in  sound.  The  sounds 
were  different  from  those  I  had  become  accustomed 
to  in  my  own  cave  fronting  the  beach.  The  groans 
of  the  wounded,  the  rattle  of  the  mule  carts  coming 
and  going  in  the  darkness,  and  the  chatter  of  the 
Indians  loading  up  with  sandbags  and  bombs,  did 
not  penetrate  so  far.  In  their  stead  came  the  tat- 
tat-tat-ing  of  the  machine  guns  and  the  phut-phut- 
phut-ing  of  the  bullets  against  the  wall  of  my 
habitation  :  at  intervals  the  loud  report  of  one  of 
our  own  guns,  followed  by  the  echo  from  this  knoll, 
straining  the  drums  of  the  ears  and  shaking  down 
little  bits  of  gritty  earth  from  the  walls  of  the  dug- 
out. Out  of  this  boom  and  echo,  lasting  for  several 
seconds,  came  the  tearing  noise  of  the  shell  through 
the  air,  gradually  diminishing  as  it  gained  distance 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  75 

but  lost  velocity.  Then  the  far-off  explosion,  with, 
we  hoped,  death  in  its  train.  For  a  time  I  read  by 
the  light  of  a  candle,  and  then  the  Greek  servant — 
named  Christ  the  Carpenter — entered  and  spread  his 
master's  British  warm  across  my  feet.  Occasionally 
in  the  night  there  would  arise  bursts  of  rifle  and 
machine-gun  fire,  and  reports  of  high-explosive 
shells  thrown  upon  some  Turkish  trench.  Then 
I  would  get  up,  and,  peering  over  the  parapet, 
watch  the  spurts  of  red  flame  in  the  darkness  and  the 
beautiful  star-shells  soaring  heavenward  to  burst 
and  fall  in  a  graceful  shower  of  falling  meteors.  I 
was  sorry  when  the  time  came  to  leave  this  dwelling- 
place. 

Our  next  move  was  into  a  little  gully  just  over 
the  hill,  where  we  thought  we  should  be  safer  from 
shot  and  shell.  There  we  had  a  more  elaborate 
system  of  dug-outs,  but  we  could  get  no  iron,  or  very 
little,  and  the  dropping  bullets  occasionally  came 
through  our  tarpaulin  roofs.  There  were  two  such 
bullet-holes  in  my  roof,  and  one  night  the  water 
collected  in  a  pool  and  suddenly  ran  down  upon  me 
as  I  was  lying  asleep  in  bed.  Then  the  Turkish 
gunners  found  us  out,  and  men  were  killed  and 
wounded  in  our  new  headquarters.  One  day,  when 
some  particularly  heavy  shelling  started,  I  came  to 
the  door  of  my  dug-out  and  saw  the  General's  mess 
suddenly  go  up  in  a  cloud  of  black,  high-explosive 
smoke.  By  the  merest  chance  I  was  not  at  that 
moment  writing  in  the  adjoining  mess,  which  also 
suffered. 


76          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

In  this  dug-out  I  lay  for  days  ill,  often  watching 
the  shells  bursting  a  few  yards  away,  and  wondering 
when  my  turn  would  come.  By  this  time  we  had 
made  "  funk-holes  "  well  into  the  side  of  the  hill- 
four  men  were  killed  and  two  badly  wounded  digging 
the  first  one — and  when  the  shelling  started  we  were 
supposed  to  hurry  into  these.  Once  I  rose  from  my 
sick-bed,  and,  hastily  donning  some  clothing,  sought 
refuge  in  the  dark  recesses  of  one  of  these  vaults. 
But  it  was  frigidly  cold  and  draughty,  and,  thinking 
a  sudden  death  by  shell-fire  preferable  to  a  lingering 
one  from  pneumonia,  I  went  back  to  bed.  Through 
the  open  door  of  my  dug-out  I  watched  the  shrapnel 
hitting  up  the  dirt  on  the  path  in  front.  A  man 
passing  was  hit  in  the  neck  and  the  wound  bled 
profusely. 

Soon  after  my  arrival  at  Anzac  the  General  Staff 
decided  that  all  the  War  Correspondents  should  be 
herded  together  in  a  special  camp  on  the  Island  of 
Imbros.  Protests  were  in  vain,  and  threats  would 
no  doubt  have  meant  being  shot  at  dawn  !  But  in 
regard  to  myself  and  the  Australian  Correspondent, 
the  Commander-in-Chief  gave  us  permission  to  live 
a  great  deal  with  our  own  men  on  the  Peninsula. 
After  waiting  on  a  shell-swept  beach  at  Anzac  for 
over  an  hour,  I  boarded  a  belated  trawler  and  crossed 
to  the  island.  At  Kephalos  some  ships  had  been 
sunk  to  make  a  harbour.  A  dusty  road  led  past  a 
semicircular  smelly  beach  upon  which  seaweed  was 
rotting  in  the  hot  sun,  and  on  through  a  row  of  tents 
on  the  one  hand  and  Greek  canteens  on  the  other. 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  77 

Inland,  the  island  rose  in  a  series  of  ilex-covered 
hills  of  volcanic  rock,  very  beautiful  in  colouring. 
The  bay  was  filled  with  battleships,  cruisers,  de- 
stroyers, and  ships  of  various  size  and  kind.  Later 
seaplanes,  aeroplanes,  and  the  "  Silver  Sausage  " — 
a  small  airship — came  and  went,  and  strange- 
looking  "  blister "  cruisers  and  stranger-looking 
monitors  with  huge  guns  took  up  anchorage  there. 
We  were  in  the  midst  of  all  the  growing  complexities 
of  modern  warfare. 

About  the  Greek  canteens  the  "  Tommies  "  and 
the  flies  appeared  to  swarm  in  equal  numbers,  the 
former  buying  at  ruinous  prices  choice  articles  of 
food,  and  the  latter  doing  their  best  to  poison  it 
before  it  could  be  eaten.  A  crowd  had  gathered 
about  a  table  on  which  a  recalcitrant  labourer  was 
being  beaten.  Egyptians  and  Greeks  looked  on. 
"  Wot  are  they  doin'  there  ?  "  asked  a  passing 
' '  Tommy. "  "  Dunno, ' '  came  the  prompt  reply  from 
the  other  soldier  ;  "I  fancy  they're  electin'  another 
King  o'  Greece  !  " 

In  front  of  a  windowless  stone  house  sat  a  decrepit 
Greek,  with  a  dark-eyed,  olive-complexioned  girl 
in  shabby  dress  and  stockinged  feet,  gazing  idly 
at  the  soldiers.  An  old  crone  hobbled  about  in  the 
background.  The  other  and  younger  Greeks  went 
on  selling  their  eggs  and  onions,  their  chocolate 
and  tomatoes.  And  only  across  the  way  was  Ida, 
catching  the  last  rays  of  the  setting  sun,  and  at 
its  feet  Scamander  and  Simois,  where  once  Poseidon 
sat  enthroned.  Shades  of  Menelaus  and  Helen  and 


78          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

all  the  great  ones  of  their  time  !  How  were  the 
mighty  fallen  ! 

No  one  seemed  to  know  where  the  War  Corre- 
spondents' Camp  was,  but  at  last  I  came  suddenly 
upon  it  in  a  vineyard  fringed  with  umbrageous  trees, 
and  at  a  table  in  the  shade  of  these  trees  a  young 
man,  bareheaded  and  in  his  shirt-sleeves,  at  his  al- 
fresco meal.  This  was  a  famous  War  Correspondent. 
In  the  stirring  times  to  come,  we  were  to  see  a  good 
deal  of  each  other,  and  to  share  many  dangers  and 
adventures  in  common.  But  in  so  far  as  I  was  con- 
cerned the  War  Correspondents'  Camp  existed  only 
in  the  imagination  of  the  General  Staff.  There  was 
no  tent  for  me,  but  eventually  I  slept  in  a  tent 
where  there  were  two  machine  guns,  and  next  day  I 
got  my  own. 

In  time,  largely  through  the  determination  of 
my  fellow  scribe,  and  the  genius  of  an  interpreter, 
half  Scot,  half  Serb,  who  had  among  other  things 
been  manager  of  the  Moulin  Rouge,  we  made  this 
camp  quite  a  pleasant  place,  at  once  the  joy  of  all 
invited  to  it  and  the  envy  of  all  who  passed  by. 
Bartlett,  Nevinson,  Lawrence,  and  Russell,  who  were 
the  British  Correspondents,  lived  there  nearly  all  the 
time,  making  pilgrimages  to  the  Peninsula,  while 
Bean  and  I,  who  lived  mostly  at  Anzac,  came  to  it 
occasionally  as  a  haven  of  refuge,  where,  in  safety 
from  the  Turkish  shells  and  bullets,  we  could  write 
up — as  far  as  the  Censor  would  allow — the  doings 
of  our  own  men.  There,  also,  we  could  get  some 
good  food,  and  Greek  wine.  Lawrence  had  made  a 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  79 

journey  to  Malta  and  had  returned  with  food  and 
drink  and  a  Maltese  cook.  That  feat,  but  more 
especially  the  getting  of  a  Maltese  cook  within  the 
zone  of  war,  will  remain  for  ever  his  magnum  opus. 
But  the  cook  did  not  turn  out  to  be  all  our  fancy 
painted  him.  He  lasted  only  a  little  longer  than  the 
wine.  We  gave  him  £10  and  shipped  him  back  to 
his  native  island,  and  a  young  Greek,  who  was  a 
Turkish  subject  and  a  refugee,  was  installed  in  his 
stead. 

Across  the  island  were  the  picturesque  villages 
of  Isotherace,  Panagia,  and  Castro,  and  to  these  we 
made  occasional  pilgrimages  for  more  food  and  wine. 
These  journeys  are  still  pleasant  memories. 
Mounted  on  the  little  Balkan  ponies,  led  by  sandalled 
Greeks  across  the  mountain  paths,  we  formed  quite 
a  cavalcade  and  looked  for  all  the  world  like  a 
scene  from  a  Passion  play.  In  the  gullies  there 
was  a  wealth  of  fern  and  bracken  and  scented  ver- 
bena, and  many  other  wild-flowers.  The  mulberry 
trees  were  laden  with  ripe  fruit.  Greek  peasants — 
generally  the  women — were  threshing  their  scanty 
store  of  corn,  beating  it  out  in  the  old  way  with  the 
hooves  of  horses  or  bullocks  or  asses  that  they  drove 
round  and  round  the  narrow,  stone-flagged  circles  that 
dotted  the  land.  Afterwards  the  corn  was  ground 
in  mills  driven  by  the  ^Egean  winds.  At  the  top 
of  the  pass  we  came  upon  a  fountain  from  which 
the  water  was  slowly  trickling  from  the  solid  basalt, 
clear  and  cool.  Crickets  sang  in  the  hot  sun,  and 
butterflies — brown,  and  golden  yellow,  and  palest 


8o          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

blue — flew  across  the  mountain  path — a  path  that 
looked  as  if  it  had  been  made  in  the  time  of  Caesar 
and  had  not  been  repaired  since.  We  came  upon 
flocks  of  goats  with  tinkling  bells,  and  upon  vine- 
yards and  olive  groves.  But  for  the  distant  boom 
of  a  ship's  gun  firing  on  Achi  Baba  one  might  have 
imagined  that  there  was  no  such  thing  as  war. 
And  yet  next  day  we  were  in  the  very  midst  of  it. 

As  the  hot  summer  passed,  and  autumn  came 
quickly  on  his  heels,  we  bethought  us  that  we  could 
not  much  longer  live  in  tents,  so  we  sought  for  a 
less  airy  and  more  enduring  habitation.  On  the 
side  of  a  hill  about  a  mile  away,  there  was  a  small 
village  of  stone  houses,  and  among  them  one  that 
was  almost  new.  It  was  a  veritable  castle,  for  it 
had  two  stories.  That  is,  it  had  one  room  on  top  of 
the  other  two.  We  discovered  the  owner,  after 
having  decided  upon  a  price  which  to  offer  him. 
But  first  of  all  we  asked  the  Greek  what  he  would 
take.  This,  coming  from  men  of  a  literary  turn, 
was  a  real  inspiration,  and,  to  our  amazement,  the 
Greek  demanded  only  about  half  what  we  were 
prepared  to  give.  Having  sufficiently  recovered 
from  the  shock,  without  giving  any  undue  indication 
of  the  fact,  we  told  him  his  price  was  too  high,  and 
offered  him  a  still  lower  sum.  Finally  we  split  the 
difference  and  the  house  was  ours.  Afterwards 
we  found  that  a  friend  with  the  true  commercial 
instinct  had  got  a  house  at  a  still  cheaper  rate  ! 

In  late  autumn  we  moved  in.  Soon  afterwards 
Sir  Ian  Hamilton,  who  had  been  recalled  from  the 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  81 

Dardanelles,  came  with  some  members  of  his  per- 
sonal staff  riding  up  the  pathway  to  say  good-bye 
to  us.  He  smiled  when  he  saw  our  quarters,  the 
rude  little  stone  house  through  which  the  wind 
whistled,  and  he  expressed  regret  that  he  had  not 
brought  along  the  official  photographer  to  make  a 
picture  of  it.  But  with  haughty  pride  we  pointed 
to  its  two  stories,  and  told  him  that  it  was  the  finest 
thing  in  architecture  on  the  island  since  the  time 
of  Pericles.  This  seemed  to  amuse  him,  and  from 
that  day  we  dated  our  letters  from  the  Chateau 
Pericles. 

From  the  owner  of  the  Chateau  we  bought 
attenuated  vegetables  and  diminutive  eggs  at 
prices  that  made  amends  for  anything  that  his 
want  of  temerity  might  have  cost  him  in  the  matter 
of  rent.  His  wife,  we  hoped,  would  do  our  washing 
in  the  intervals  in  which  she  was  not  engaged  in 
agriculture.  She  was  no  doubt  a  direct  descendant 
of  the  Venus  Milo,  but  she  did  not  look  like  it. 
Indeed,  she  was  no  longer  beautiful.  She  was,  of 
course,  suitably  draped — in  very  baggy  trousers 
gathered  in  at  the  ankles,  a  bodice  of  rural  design, 
and  about  her  classic  brow  a  bandage  so  faded  that 
it  might  have  come  from  some  derelict  Field  Ambu- 
lance after  a  strenuous  battle.  Her  baggy  trousers 
gave  her  a  somewhat  comic  look  when  she  walked- 
especially  when  she  was  going  away  from  one. 

On  the  whole  we  were  fairly  happy  in  the  Chateau 
Pericles.  There  were  now  only  three  of  us,  for 
Bartlett  had  gone  to  London,  and  Nevinson  was  at 

G 


82          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

Salonika.  Bean  and  Lawrence  occupied  the  upper 
room  of  our  castle,  and  I  a  dark,  narrow  chamber 
down  below,  in  which  most  of  the  room  was  taken 
up  by  two  great  corn-bins  made  of  stone  covered 
with  a  plaster  of  mud  and  straw.  There  were  other 
inhabitants  besides  myself  here,  including  mice.  As 
my  room  was  also  the  store-room,  and  the  mice 
had  a  penchant  for  macaroni  and  candles,  they 
remained  with  me  to  the  last.  The  third  room  of 
the  Chateau  Pericles  we  used  as  a  dining-  and  a 
writing-room,  but  one  had  to  beware,  for  the  room 
above  had  a  wooden  floor  with  great  cracks  in  it, 
and  when  the  floor  was  being  scrubbed,  or  when  at 
rare  intervals  its  occupants  had  a  bath,  the  man 
below  was  apt  to  get  a  bath  also. 

Our  servants  occupied  a  room  outside,  and  the 
cook  was  given  an  outhouse  that  all  our  ingenuity 
failed  to  make  watertight.  After  a  time  he  showed 
a  decided  inclination  to  become  a  levanter  in  more 
than  the  original  sense,  so  we  had  to  put  the  fear 
of  God  and  the  P.M.  into  him.  If  he  did  not  cook 
for  us,  we  said  we  would  hand  him  over  to  the  Turks. 
Failing  that,  he  might  have  to  join  the  Greek  Army. 
At  the  thought  of  this  he  grew  pale.  But  we 
maintained  our  biggest  hold  on  him  by  always 
keeping  at  least  a  fortnight  of  his  wages  in  hand, 
for,  to  a  Greek,  the  fear  of  all  his  gods,  temporal 
and  spiritual,  is  as  nothing  to  the  dread  of  losing 
earned  increment.  Poor  beggar  !  he  did  not  have  a 
very  hilarious  time,  for  he  had  no  one  to  talk  to, 
and  our  servants,  I  fear,  rather  bullied  him.  Turner's 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  83 

English  and  Maloney's  Irish  brogue  were  too  much 
for  him,  while  our  Greek  was  not  what  it  ought  to 
be.  Apparently,  also,  the  Greek  and  the  Celt  do 
no  assimilate,  for  one  day  I  found  the  Greek  cook 
chasing  Maloney  around  our  demesne  with  a  knife. 
When  Greek  meets  Greek  there  is  supposed  to  be  a 
tussle,  but  when  Greek  meets  Celt,  then  the  real 
fun  begins.  Maloney  was  on  the  run  till  he  reached 
the  wood-pile,  from  which,  in  passing,  he  grabbed 
an  axe.  I  came  upon  the  scene  as  the  enemy  was 
about  to  counter-attack,  and,  at  the  risk  of  my  own 
life,  prevented  bloodshed.  Maloney  said  the  cook 
had  "  disinsulted "  him,  but  as  he  must  have 
"  disinsulted  "  him  in  Greek  I  could  not  ascertain 
how  Maloney  became  aware  of  the  fact.  For  a  time 
the  battle  was  continued  with  words,  the  com- 
batants having  been  persuaded  to  lay  aside  the  axe 
and  the  knife,  but,  what  with  the  cook's  incoherent 
Greek  and  Maloney's  excited  and  tearful  Irish,  it  was 
difficult  for  one  to  maintain  that  solemnity  of 
feature  that  is  so  necessary  an  adjunct  to  discipline 
and  authority.  But  in  the  end  my  persuasion  won 
the  day,  and  Peace  once  more  folded  her  wings  and 
perched  above  the  lintel  of  the  one  door  that  led 
into  the  Chateau  Pericles. 

I  have  one  other  memory  of  the  Chateau  Pericles 
that  will  not  fade  while  memory  lasts.  It  was  during 
the  great  blizzard  that  played  havoc  with  our  lines 
of  communications  and  strewed  our  beaches  with 
wreckage.  I  am  alone  in  the  Chateau.  Bean  is 
stormbound  on  the  Peninsula,  and  Lawrence, 


84          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

who  after  a  delay  that  almost  proved  disastrous 
had  perforce  gone  off  to  Egypt  for  clothes,  is  vainly 
endeavouring  to  get  passage  back  again.  Ugh  ! 
how  the  cold  wind  shrieks  about  the  gables  and 
whistles  through  the  cracks  and  crannies.  At  times 
it  comes  moaning  with  splashes  of  rain.  It  is  a 
regular  tempest,  with  the  thunder  growling  above 
it  all.  The  elements  as  well  as  the  nations  are  at 
war.  A  blinding  flash  has  just  lit  up  the  gloom,  and 
the  crashing  thunder  comes  with  the  roar  of  a 
fourteen-inch  gun,  only  that  it  reverberates  longer 
among  the  rocky  hills  of  the  island.  Turner,  the 
mildest-mannered  of  men,  who  was  in  five  bayonet 
charges  and  has  a  good  toll  of  Turks  to  his  credit, 
has  come  in  with  a  swirl  of  wind  and  rain  to  tell  me 
that  our  Greek  cook  is  "  drownded  out."  "  We'll 
'ave  to  shift  the  iron  on  'is  roof  round  the  other 
way,  sir,"  he  continues,  adding  cheerfully,  "  There's 
another  storm  comin'  up  on  top  o'  this  one,  sir. 
Looks  as  if  it's  goin'  to  be  a  regular  snorter."  And 
it  was  ! 

From  the  dug-outs  of  Gallipoli  and  the  Chateau 
Pericles  on  Imbros  to  a  hospital  in  Cairo,  thence 
to  the  luxury  of  Shepheard's,  and  on  to  a  tent  in 
the  desert  at  Lake  Timsah,  I  went  by  uncertain 
stages,  never  knowing  what  a  day  or  an  hour  might 
bring  forth.  Months  afterwards  it  was  a  pleasant 
change  to  meet  the  British  War  Correspondents,  and, 
for  a  time,  to  be  their  honoured  guest  in  a  real 
chateau  in  France,  with  a  great  garden,  a  tennis 
lawn,  a  billiard  table,  and  five  motor-cars  at  their 


ABODES   OF  AN  ANZAC  85 

disposal.  There  I  slept  in  a  great  high-ceilinged 
room  into  which  almost  you  could  have  put  the 
whole  of  the  Chateau  Pericles,  and  all  the  dug-outs 
I  ever  had  on  Gallipoli. 

And  yet  there  are  times  when  wistful  eyes  look 
back  across  the  fields  of  France  and  the  leagues  of 
sea  that  separate  me  from  my  old  bodes  at  Anzac. 


GOOD-BYE  TO  ABDUL 

EARLY  in  December,  1915,  it  was  stated  in 
the  House  of  Lords  that  a  well-known 
General  had  recommended  the  evacuation  of  the 
British  and  French  armies  on  Gallipoli.  The  state- 
ment was  an  extraordinary  one  to  make  public  at 
such  a  time,  and  the  soldiers  were  furious.  But  on 
second  thoughts  we  said  to  ourselves:  "Well, 
the  Turks  will  never  think  we  are  going  to  abandon 
the  expedition,  because  if  we  were  we  should  not  be 
such  damned  fools  as  to  say  so."  Even  the  Germans 
were  misled  into  that  idea. 

The  Berliner  Tageblatt  stated  that  the  Dardanelles 
undertaking  would  have  been  abandoned  long  ago 
if  it  were  as  easy  to  get  out  of  the  jaws  of  tjie  lion 
as  to  get  into  them. 

Yet  in  a  few  weeks'  time  we  were  off  the  Peninsula 
and  enjoying  our  Christmas  dinner  far  away  from 
Gallipoli.  The  beast  had  been  disappointed  of  his 
prey  at  Anzac.  The  jaws  of  the  Turko-German  lion 
had  snapped  ;  but  they  had  snapped  a  little  too  late. 
The  story  of  how  the  enemy  was  outwitted  is  a 
fascinatingly  interesting '  ,-one  ;  but  it  cannot  even 

86 


ABODES  OF  AN  ANZAC  87 

yet  be  told  in  detail.  The  joke  of  the  whole  thing, 
apparently,  was  that  the  Turks,  instead  of  thinking 
we  were  evacuating,  thought  we  were  landing  three 
new  divisions  to  make  another  attack.  But  what- 
ever happened,  there  can  be  not  the  least  doubt 
that  the  Turkish  commander  was  left  lamenting  the 
fact  that  he  had  at  least  failed  to  scupper  our  rear- 
guard, and  that  he  did  not  even  capture  one  solitary 
machine  gun. 

The  great  thing  from  our  point  of  view  was  to 
make  it  appear  from  day  to  day  as  if  events  were 
running  their  ordinary  course.  The  cleverness  and 
the  resource  with  which  this  was  accomplished  will 
one  day  pass  into  history  in  detail.  The  final  opera- 
tion orders  were  a  model  of  clear  thinking  and 
organization  from  the  main  principles  down  to  the 
smallest  detail  of  the  Great  Adventure.  One  and 
all,  from  the  highest  commands  down  to  the  privates 
in  the  trenches,  carried  them  out  with  a  loyal  co- 
operation and  enthusiasm  worthy  of  the  best 
traditions  of  our  race.  To  a  non-combatant  on  the 
Peninsula  carefully  watching  events  from  day  to 
day  the  position  appeared  to  bristle  with  difficulties, 
some  of  which  it  seemed  almost  hopeless  to  sur- 
mount. To  such  an  extent  was  this  the  case  that 
the  final  triumphant  success,  when  it  did  come,  was 
a  little  difficult  of  realization. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  Great  Adventure  the 
humorists  got  to  work,  and  it  was  no  uncommon 
sight  to  see  a  comfortable  dug-out  bearing  the 
notice — A  Louer.  Many  of  the  men  left  messages  for 


88          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

Abdul — "  A  Merry  Christmas  "  and  "  Good  wishes 
for  the  New  Year."  One  gunnery  officer  gathered 
together  all  the  bottles  he  could  find  and  piled  them 
outside  the  mess.  "  The  Turk/'  he  said,  "  will 
think  our  last  strafe  was  the  result  of  a  great  carou- 
sal." One  battery  away  on  the  right  left  its  mess- 
table  set  with  bully  beef,  a  bottle  of  whisky,  and 
some  other  odds  and  ends,  "  With  compliments 
to  the  commander  of  '  Beachy  Bill.' '  On  the  table 
in  another  dug-out  there  was  left  a  gramophone, 
wound  up  and  with  the  needle  on  the  record  ready 
to  give  out  the  tune.  The  air  was  "  The  Turkish 
Patrol." 

In  our  mess,  however  sad  or  serious  we  might  be 
inwardly,  we  managed  at  least  to  maintain  a  cheer- 
ful exterior,  extending  mock  sympathy  to  the  "  die- 
hards,"  and  chaffing  each  other  as  to  the  various 
capacities  that  we  should  presently  be  appearing  in 
at  Constantinople. 

The  idea  was  sedulously  cultivated  that  the  men 
were  going  into  rest  camps  ;  but  the  intelligence 
of  the  colonial  troops  was  too  keen  to  permit  of  the 
continuance  of  this  deception.  A  query  to  the  O.C. 
Artillery  as  to  when  his  second  lot  of  guns  were 
going  into  the  "  rest  camp  "  elicited  only  a  smile, 
and  a  suggestion  that  the  guns  were  getting  tired 
was  an  insult  that  rankled  but  could  not  be  replied 
to. 

In  the  dug-outs,  in  the  trenches,  and  in  the 
artillery  observation  posts  various  kindly  messages, 
and  even  presents  of  food,  were  left  for  our  gallant 


GOOD-BYE  TO  ABDUL  89 

foes.  One  New  Zealand  artillery  officer,  whose 
skull  was  laid  bare  by  a  shell  that  came  through 
the  roof  of  his  observation  post,  left  a  message  for  the 
Turkish  gunners  to  say  that  the  shell  "  did  not  get 
him."  That  same  officer  carried  on  till  his  gun  was 
withdrawn  and  safely  placed  on  board  an  outgoing 
ship. 

But  underlying  all  this  fun  and  frolic  that  is  so 
well-recognized  a  trait  of  British  character  in  the 
presence  of  extreme  danger,  there  was  a  deeper 
feeling  of  sadness  that  we  should  be  leaving,  without 
a  further  struggle,  the  ground  so  dearly  won — the 
ilex-covered  valleys  and  hills,  gained  and  held  with 
the  life's  blood  of  so  many  of  the  noblest  and  best 
of  New  Zealand's  and  Australia's  sons.  Somewhat 
poetically  one  of  the  New  Zealand  soldiers  put  this 
phase  of  thought  to  his  Battalion  Commander : 
"  I  hope,  sir,"  he  said,  "  that  those  fellows  who  lie 
buried  along  the  Dere  will  be  soundly  sleeping  and 
not  hear  us  as  we  march  away."  The  idea  that  his 
dead  comrades  might  think  the  living  were  forsaking 
them  seemed  to  have  made  a  deep  impression  on  his 
mind. 

The  spirit  of  the  men  towards  the  close  was 
splendid.  As  the  last  days  drew  near  the  suspense 
grew  greater.  Did  the  Turks  know  that  we  were 
evacuating  ?  Would  they  attack  at  the  last  mo- 
ment our  attenuated  lines  ?  These  were  questions 
that  were  ever  uppermost  in  our  minds  ;  but  even 
up  to  the  last  day  we  had  a  supreme  confidence  in 
our  ability  to  repel  any  Turkish  attack  that  might 


90          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

be  launched  upon  us.  The  New  Zealand  General — 
now  in  command  of  the  Army  Corps — finally  took 
all  ranks  into  his  confidence,  and  issued  an  order 
expressing  his  trust  in  their  discretion  and  their 
high  soldierly  qualities  to  carry  out  a  task  the  suc- 
cess of  which  would  largely  depend  upon  their 
individual  efforts.  In  the  case  of  an  attack  he 
expressed  himself  confident  that  the  men  who  had 
to  their  credit  such  deeds  as  the  original  landing 
at  Anzac,  the  repulse  of  the  big  Turkish  attack  on 
May  18,  the  capture  of  Lone  Pine,  the  Apex,  and 
Hill  60,  would  hold  their  ground  with  the  same 
valour  and  steadfastness  as  heretofore,  however  small 
in  numbers  they  might  be.  The  splendid  spirit  of 
the  men  at  the  finish  showed  that  this  confidence  was 
not  misplaced. 

On  the  Friday  I  went  into  the  firing  line  on  the 
Apex — the  highest  ground  won  in  all  the  fighting — 
and  found  the  New  Zealanders,  who  still  occupied 
that  post  of  honour,  tumbling  over  one  another  to 
be  the  last  to  leave.  The  Colonel  commanding  one 
battalion  called  for  thirty  volunteers  from  two 
companies.  Every  man  in  each  company  volun- 
teered. Men  were  coming  to  their  commanders  and 
begging  that  they  might  be  allowed  to  be  in  the 
last  lot  to  go. 

"  Do  let  me  stay,"  said  one  man.  "  I  was  in  the 
landing,  and  I  should  like  to  be  one  of  the  last  to 
leave." 

It  was  just  the  same  with  the  Australians — they 
all  wanted  to  be  in  the  "  Diehards." 


GOOD-BYE  TO  ABDUL  91 

"  Have  you  many  volunteers  for  the  '  Die- 
hards  '  ?  "  I  asked  one  commander. 

"  Every  mother's  son  of  them  wants  to  be  a  '  Die- 
hard '  I  "  he  replied. 

And  this,  mind  you,  was  at  a  time  when  we 
thought  that  most  of  the  "  Diehards  "  would,  for  a 
certainty,  be  either  killed,  wounded,  or  taken 
prisoner — at  a  time  when  a  little  jumpiness  and 
hesitation  might  very  well  have  been  expected. 
In  one  position  on  the  left,  when  the  last  lot  assem- 
bled at  the  cookhouse,  it  was  found  that  there 
were  two  missing.  One  had  gone  back  to  the  firing 
line  for  his  pipe,  the  other  for  something  he  had  left 
behind  in  his  bivouac  ! 

With  such  excellent  organization  on  the  part  of 
the  staff,  and  such  brave  and  loyal  co-operation  and 
sang-froid  on  the  part  of  the  officers  and  men  in  the 
trenches,  it  is  perhaps,  after  all,  not  to  be  wondered 
at  that  the  Turks  were  busy  shelling  the  vacant 
trenches  and  the  deserted  beaches  a  day  after  men, 
mules,  and  guns  were  already  well  across  the  Gulf  of 
Saros,  in  the  language  of  the  official  dispatch,  "  to 
be  employed  elsewhere."  They  had  triumphantly 
succeeded  in  one  of  the  most  difficult  of  operations — 
in  a  feat  that  is  unique  in  the  annals  of  warfare. 


INTO  THE  DESERT 

IT  is  winter,  and  we  are  in  Egypt  again.  The 
second  season  since  the  war  began  is  in  full 
swing  at  Cairo,  but  the  tropic  suits  and  gay  gowns 
of  the  rich  cosmopolitan  tourists  are  no  longer  to 
be  seen.  Khaki  still  reigns.  Generals  and  Colonels 
and  Majors  and  all  the  other  official  ranks  fill  the 
two  dining-rooms  and  the  grill-room  at  Shepheard's. 
A  countess  from  the  Continent,  a  few  officers'  wives, 
overseas  nurses  in  their  drab  grey  relieved  with  scar- 
let capes — the  Canadians  strikingly  tall  and  hand- 
some in  their  well-cut  military  dark  blue  and  shining 
gilt  buttons — mingle  with  the  Khaki  throng.  At  din- 
ner a  band  plays,  and  on  Saturday  evenings  there  is  a 
dance  in  the  splendid,  domed  Moorish  Hall.  At  the 
Continental  it  is  very  much  the  same.  Other  well- 
known  hotels  are  shut,  or  are  used  as  hospitals. 
The  Heliopolis  Hotel — the  largest  in  the  world — 
houses  only  sick  and  wounded.  There  are  few  of 
the  latter  now.  The  Semiramis  boards  and  lodges 
a  hundred  and  fifty  nurses — mostly  unemployed. 
Later  there  may  be  work  for  them  to  do,  but  at 
present  there  is  no  fighting  in  our  zone.  The  army 

£3 


94          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

is  "  somewhere  in  Egypt,"  doing  desert  marches, 
building  roads  and  railways,  laying  pipe  and  tele- 
graph lines,  and  making  trenches.  A  "  Tommy  " 
writes  home  to  his  mother  to  say  that  he  is  in  a 
strange  country  inhabited  mostly  by  natives.  He 
says  that  where  he  is  camped  there  are  no  shops — 
only  sand.  He  walks  out  a  mile  or  two  and  there 
is  more  blanky  sand.  He  adds  a  line  asking  her  to 
tell  father  that  there  is  no  use  coming  out  here  to 
grow  rhubarb  ! 

The  new  Colonial  troops  are  interested :  the  old 
ones  are  "  fed  up/'  because  a  year  ago  they  had 
their  fill  of  the  desert.  They  do  not  forget  the 
manoeuvres  on  the  hills  beyond  the  old  Mena 
Camp,  nor  the  trying  marches  to  the  detested  third 
white  tower  and  back  that  made  them  fit  to  storm 
the  heights  of  Anzac.  The  "  Tommy,"  like  the 
average  man,  is  never  quite  contented  with  his  lot. 
At  one  time  he  is  longing  for  a  fight :  at  another 
he  is  longing  to  get  out  of  it. 

From  a  damp  dug-out  on  Gallipoli  to  the  luxurious 
appointments  of  Shepheard's  is  a  far  cry  and  a 
pleasant  change,  but,  after  a  time,  the  conventions, 
and  even  the  menus,  of  civilization  begin  to  lose 
their  novelty  and  their  charm,  and  you  long  for 
variety.  The  day  comes  when  you  experience  a 
sense  of  elation  in  buying  another  camp-bed  and  a 
canvas  bucket,  and  all  the  other  odds  and  ends 
lost,  stolen,  or  strayed,  on  Gallipoli.  With  the 
green  fields  of  the  Delta  flying  past  you  in  the 
train,  you  feel  that  you  may  be  once  more  getting 


INTO  THE  DESERT  95 

back  to  "  the  real  thing  " — to  new  thrills  and  sen- 
sations. The  palms  and  the  mud  villages,  the  tall 
robed  fellahin  toiling  in  his  field,  the  singing  sakeer 
flooding  the  land  by  the  power  of  its  patient  circling 
oxen,  the  sheep  and  goats  following  the  shepherd 
as  in  the  time  of  Moses,  are  left  behind,  and  that 
night  with  a  feeling  of  supreme  contentment  you 
unfold  your  bed  under  the  canvas  roof  on  a  floor 
of  the  clean  desert  sand.  Your  batman  takes  the 
place  of  the  big  dark  Berberin  who  served  you  in 

Cairo.     You  are  with  the  Army  again. 

***** 

It  is  not  so  easy  as  it  seems  to  get  to  the  new 
front.  Leaving  your  camp  in  the  early  morning, 
you  have  a  long  day  and  varied  means  of  locomotion 
ahead  of  you,  first  a  motor-car,  and  then  a  motor- 
launch  along  the  Canal.  The  Canal  is  always 
interesting,  and  more  interesting  now  than  ever. 
In  spite  of  the  Turco-German  menace,  ships  that 
prove  the  maritime  might  of  Britain  and  of  the 
Greater  Britain  beyond  the  Seas  still  pass  up  and 
down  between  Suez  and  Port  Said  unchallenged 
and  unharmed.  A  hundred  and  fifty  miles  away 
at  Beersheba,  the  Turkish  headquarters  are  no 
nearer  their  goal  than  they  were  a  year  ago.  A 
patrol  away  out  in  the  desert,  a  spy  caught  swim- 
ming the  Canal — these  are  the  only  near  evidences 
of  possible  attack.  Out  in  the  desert  a"  few  huddled 
corpses — skin  and  bone  and  faded  clothing — from 
which  their  covering  of  sand  has  blown,  are  still 
grimmer  reminders  of  the  fight.  The  beams  for  a 


96          LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

bridge  lie  farther  afield — evidence  of  a  dogged 
persistence  and  unwarranted  optimism  on  the  part 
of  our  friend  the  enemy.  He  failed  miserably 

then  :    he  will  fail  again. 

***** 

Leaving  our  launch  we  climb  a  sloping  roadway 
on  the  eastern  bank  and  find  ourselves  at  a  divisional 
headquarters.  The  zigzag  lines  of  the  old  trenches 
with  their  entanglements  of  barbed  wire  are  still 
there,  and  new  wire  has  been  added  to  make  the 
barrier  more  formidable.  Here  the  problem  of 
further  transport  faces  us,  for  every  man,  every 
horse,  every  mule,  every  camel,  is  at  work.  Event- 
ually we  get  three  transport  horses  and  start  gaily 
on  our  journey  eastward.  It  comes  near  to  being  a 
disastrous  start,  for  the  big  chestnut  that  one  of  the 
party  has  mounted  is  a  bolter  and  a  buck  jumper,  and 
has  a  mouth  as  hard  as  iron.  He  at  once  proceeds 
to  show  off  all  these  attributes,  with  the  result  that 
the  rider  is  soon  lying  stunned  on  the  sand.  Fortu- 
nately it  is  sand.  In  due  time  the  journey  is 
resumed — in  a  motor-wagon,  one  of  the  party 
riding  ahead  on  the  tamest  horse  of  the  trio. 

As  far  as  the  road  runs  there  is  much  traffic.  A 
train  with  narrow  wagons  and  a  quaint  little  George 
Stephenson  engine  comes  rumbling  past.  On  the 
road  motor-lorries  and  mule-carts  come  and  go,  and 
out  on  the  right  there  is  another  little  railway  with 
a  still  narrower  gauge.  The  small  trucks  are  drawn 
by  mules.  They  carry  stone  for  the  road — a  friable 
limestone  that  binds  fairly  well  after  it  is  watered. 


INTO  THE  DESERT  97 

Each  truck  has  an  Australian  soldier,  and  one  or 
two  "  gypies "  on  it,  one  man  generally  riding 
postilion.  The  black  and  the  white,  Christian  and 
Mohammedan,  work  cheerily  together  in  the  common 
cause.  The  lies  of  the  German  press  about  shooting 
down  the  redifs,  and  that  weird  tale  of  an  Australian 
officer  killing  two  of  his  Indian  orderlies  because 
they  were  "  guilty  of  clumsiness,"  would  make  our 
men  smile.  Anyhow,  our  officers  never  have  Indian 
orderlies. 

***** 

The  time  passes  in  conversation  with  a  Colonial 
officer  who  was  a  plumber,  and  has  been  promoted 
from  the  ranks.  He  would  not  appear  to  great 
advantage  in  Bond  Street,  nor  feel  quite  at  ease  in  a 
London  drawing-room,  but  he  has  been  at  Anzac 
all  the  time,  and  has  an  amazing  singleness  of  pur- 
pose in  his  work.  The  sand  doesn't  worry  him  : 
he  doesn't  care  where  he  may  be  sent — France, 
Mesopotamia,  Salonika.  It  is  all  the  same  to  him 
so  long  as  he  is  doing  his  bit  to  end  the  war  satis- 
factorily. Yes,  he  would  like  to  see  the  end  of  it. 
"  Nine  solid  months  at  Anzac  and  only  hit  once  : 
I've  got  a  feeling  I'll  come  through  all  right,"  he 
adds.  He  is  married — a  wife  and  three  kiddies. 
They  are  beginning  already  to  ask  when  Daddy  is 
coming  home,  and  the  youngest  one  doesn't  know 
him.  But  he  had  to  go  to  the  war.  He  could  not 
have  borne  in  after  years,  had  he  not  gone,  to  have 
his  children  asking  where  were  his  medals  ?  He  has 
been  volunteer  soldiering  for  years,  has  gone  through 


98          LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

every  rank,  and  is  proud  that  he  has  earned  his 
commission  through  work  and  not  through  the  death 
of  another  above  him.  He  has  the  Tommies'  un- 
shaken confidence  in  Kitchener.  "  Give  '  Kitch  ' 
a  free  hand,"  he  says.  "  Let  him  go  in,  and,  by 
God,  I  believe  he'll  go  right  through."  He  has 
one  other  pet  idea — why  not  employ  them  Zulus  ? 
They're  good  fighters,  and  they  populate  quickly,  and 
have  so  many  wives,  according  to  what  he  has  read, 
that  it  would  not  matter  if  a  good  many  of  them  got 
killed  off.  What's  the  use  of  the  White  King  'avhV 
a  dog  if  he  won't  let  him  bark  ?  Give  'em  white 
officers  and  a  fair  number  of  non.  corns,  and  they'd 
be  all  right.  If  we  could  make  good  fighters  out  of 
our  Fijis  and  our  Indians,  why  not  out  of  them  ? 
Yes,  he  was  sure  the  war  was  going  all  right.  One 
could  not  but  admire  his  splendid  optimism.  He 
left  to  go  on  with  his  job,  and  made  me  free  of  his 
tent  and  anything  that  was  in  it. 


The  question  of  transport  again  arose.  It  was 
solved  by  one  man  riding  the  tame  horse,  and 
the  Bothers  getting  into  two  things  like  water- 
troughs  made  of  scantling  and  canvas,  and  slung 
high  up  on  either  side  of  a  camel.  The  camel 
eyed  us  with  a  sad  superciliousness  as  he  bent 
himself  in  sections  to  the  ground.  We  prepared 
to  mount.  Mahomed  Ishtak  of  Ismailia,  our 
camel-driver,  let  a  broad  grin  overspread  his 
handsome  features  as  we  prepared  for  the  next 


INTO  THE   DESERT  99 

act.  The  camel  gave  a  little  wriggle  in  front  and 
then  arose  suddenly  in  jerks  from  behind,  depressing 
our  heads  and  sending  our  feet  in  the  air.  He 
repeated  this  performance  from  the  front  just  as 
suddenly,  and,  finally,  we  found  ourselves  in  a  more 
or  less  recumbent  position,  smiling  at  each  other 
from  our  troughs  across  his  wooden  saddle.  Then 
Mahomed  made  a  strange  noise  in  his  throat,  and  the 
camel  started  off  at  a  heaving,  swaying  gait  that 
boded  no  good  to  any  man's  anatomy.  This  gait  he 
varied  from  time  to  time  as  the  whim  took  him. 
Now  it  was  a  kind  of  waltz  punctuated  with  the  hop 
of  the  polka  mazurka  at  frequent  but  uncertain 
intervals.  Just  as  you  were  becoming  used  to  this, 
the  beast  would  take  it  into  its  head  to  introduce 
the  short,  jerky,  bending  step  of  the  Argentine  tango 
as  performed  by  an  energetic  but  rather  clumsy 
amateur.  One  began  to  study  one's  own  body  with 
a  new  interest  and  some  solicitude.  The  pitching 
motion  gave  you  grave  concern  about  your  luncheon 
on  the  one  hand,  and  your  lumbar  region  on  the 
other.  Especially  was  this  the  case  if  you  sat  up. 
In  a  semi-reclining  position,  you  were  in  danger  of 
rubbing  the  skin  off  certain  other  parts  of  your 
anatomy.  Half  a  mile  of  experiment  in  every  con- 
ceivable attitude  led  to  the  conclusion  that  one 
could  reduce  bumping  and  abrasion  to  a  bearable 
but  still  unsatisfactory  minimum  by  lying  supine 
on  the  bottom  of  the  trough.  But,  at  times  when 
the  troughs  gave  indication  of  slipping  right  round 
the  animal,  we  could  not  resist  the  temptation  to  sit 


ioo        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

up  again.  Then  we  would  note  Mahomed's  grinning 
countenance  down  below — a  very  long  way  down 
it  seemed — and  listen  to  his  "  quaise  keteer  "  (it  is 
very  good)  with  mixed  feelings  of  incredulity  and 
contempt.  However,  in  due  time,  by  the  grace 
of  the  Prophet  and  the  good  guidance  of  Mahomed 
Ishtak,  the  camel  got  us  there.  We  walked 
back! 


In  war  in  the  Near  East  the  water  problem 
is  difficult  to  solve.  Having  trudged  back  through 
the  heavy  sand,  we  found  that  night  had  come 
upon  us  with  tropic  suddenness.  We  had  the 
luck  to  get  back  to  the  Canal  in  a  motor-car. 
There  were  seven  in  it,  with  seats  for  four,  and  the 
road  was  rough,  but  the  springs  held.  At  the  Canal 
we  found  a  patrol  boat  awaiting  our  arrival,  and  soon 
we  set  gaily  off  upon  the  final  stage  of  our  journey. 
It  came  very  near  to  being  the  last  journey  for  one 
of  us,  for,  in  the  darkness,  and  not  hearing  his 
challenge,  we  were  fired  upon  by  a  sentry.  We  saw 
the  flash  and  heard  the  crack  of  the  rifle.  The 
bullet  whistled  between  us  and  splashed  in  the 
water  just  over  the  side  of  the  boat.  The  launch 
was  stopped  and  the  skipper  shouted  back,  "  Patrol, 
patrol,"  in  a  voice  loud  enough  to  wake  the  dead. 
Late  in  the  day,  with  a  glorious  moon  now  risen,  we 
crossed  Lake  Timsah.  Another  ride  in  a  car 
along  a  smooth  road  between  an  avenue  of  lubeck 
trees  brought  us  to  our  camp  after  having  tried 


INTO  THE  DESERiKi:  101 

almost  every  available  means  of  locomotion  except 
an  aeroplane.  We  had  seen  the  new  front  and  were 
well  content.  The  Canal  was  no  longer  protecting 
the  Army  :  the  Army  was  protecting  the  Canal. 


.    •  • 


THE  BLOODING  OF  THE 
BATTALION 

THEY  were  the  first  of  a  new  brigade  that  had 
recruited  voluntarily  in  far-away  New  Zea- 
land. In  their  own  country  they  had  been  well 
trained.  In  Egypt  they  had  settled  down  to  more 
training,  and  to  await  the  second  half  of  the  brigade, 
but  in  war  it  is  the  unexpected  that  invariably  hap- 
pens, and  the  First  Battalion  was  suddenly  rushed 
off  to  the  frontier,  where  the  Senusi,  urged  on  by  the 
Germans  and  the  Turks,  had  been  making  trouble. 
The  Christmas  Day  that  they  thought  to  enjoy 
quietly  in  Cairo  was  spent  miles  away  in  the  desert 
attacking  and  routing  the  hostile  Arab  force.  With 
them  were  the  I5th  Sikhs,  some  of  the  recently 
arrived  Australian  Light  Horse,  and  English  Yeo- 
manry— the  two  latter  mounted. 

Mersa  Matruh,  near  where  the  little  army  fought, 
is  a  little  port  on  the  north-western  frontier  of  Egypt. 
There,  at  the  end  of  November,  our  smaller  frontier 
posts  at  Sollum  and  Sidi  Barni  had  been  concen- 
trated in  order  to  avoid  possible  causes  of  friction 
with  the  tribes.  It  lies  in  an  arid  zone,  with  desert 

103 


104        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

sands  and  barren  rocky  hills  beyond.  Near  the 
shore  the  water  is  brackish  ;  inland  there  are  fresh- 
water wells.  The  Senusi  and  the  neighbouring 
tribesmen  had  been  stirred  up  to  open  rebellion 
by  the  arch-conspirators  of  Europe,  whose  wonderful 
organization,  conjoined  with  a  well-lined  purse, 
reached  even  into  distant  Persia  and  the  desert 
lands  of  Mesopotamia  and  Africa.  Early  in  Decem- 
ber a  reconnoitring  force  from  Matruh  came  upon  a 
band  of  300  Arabs,  who  were  attacked  and  driven 
westward.  Of  these  thirty-five  were  killed  and  seven 
taken  prisoners.  The  British  casualties  were  sixteen 
killed  and  three  officers  and  fifteen  men  wounded. 

The  New  Zealanders  reached  Matruh  in  trawlers 
and  sweepers,  which  set  out  from  Alexandria. 
Arrived  at  their  destination  they  found  permanent 
barracks  occupied  by  an  Egyptian  garrison.  Their 
first  days  were  spent  in  fatigues  and  in  making 
entrenchments  on  the  hill  overlooking  the  station. 
Wire  entanglements  were  erected,  and  the  position 
generally  was  strengthened.  The  camp  was  close 
to  the  beach.  Drinking  water  had  to  be  brought 
from  Alexandria.  Each  night  a  few  shots  were 
fired  at  our  outposts  by  the  tribesmen,  who  used 
to  creep  up  under  cover  of  the  darkness,  and  one  or 
two  of  our  men  were  hit.  The  main  body  of  the 
Arab  force  was  encamped  in  a  rocky  donga  some 
seven  miles  away  to  the  southward. 

On  Christmas  Day  it  was  decided  to  attack  the 
position.  The  attacking  force,  consisting  of  the 
Sikhs  and  the  New  Zealanders,  left  camp  at  4  a.m. 


THE  BLOODING  OF  THE  BATTALION  105 

and  marched  for  seven  miles  along  a  rough  road 
towards  the  place  where  the  enemy  had  been  spotted 
by  one  of  our  aeroplanes.  The  guns  on  the  sweepers 
opened  fire,  and  a  mountain  battery  on  shore  was 
also  in  action.  The  first  shell  from  the  sea  hit  the 
top  of  the  hill,  and  the  second  went  just  over  it, 
where  the  enemy  were  congregated  amongst  the 
rocks  and  caves.  The  enemy  replied  with  a  field 
piece  firing  common  shell.  Three  shells  landed  on 
the  left  of  the  road,  about  a  hundred  yards  from  the 
New  Zealanders. 

Shortly  after  dawn  the  Sikhs  advanced  with 
splendid  dash  and  fought  with  great  bravery,  a 
New  Zealand  company  reinforcing  them.  This 
advance  was  the  signal  for  a  shower  of  bullets  from 
the  Arab  snipers,  none  of  whom  could  be  seen. 
Another  section  of  the  New  Zealanders  was  sent 
to  take  the  donga,  where  the  enemy,  with  his  camels, 
was  supposed  to  be.  They  advanced  quietly  in 
extended  order  to  within  600  or  700  yards  of  the 
position,  and  opened  a  heavy  fire.  The  enemy 
from  hidden  positions  replied,  and  bullets  were 
flying  about,  but  were  doing  little  damage.  Our 
force  then  advanced  to  within  400  yards  of  the 
enemy.  From  this  position  they  could  see  numbers 
of  them  sheltering  behind  rocks  and  in  caves  across 
the  donga,  and  the  order  was  given  to  charge  down 
and  across  it.  Led  by  their  officers,  the  men 
went  at  it  with  dash  and  enthusiasm.  At  the 
bottom  of  the  donga  the  little  force  became  bunched 
up  somewhat,  and  there  was  a  regular  fusillade  of 


io6       LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

enemy  bullets.  In  places  the  side  of  the  donga  was 
steep,  and  occasionally  the  men  let  themselves  go 
and  slid  down  fifty  feet  at  a  stretch.  In  this  manner 
they  got  within  200  yards  of  the  concealed  enemy, 
and  the  real  fighting  began.  The  Sikhs  continued 
to  fight  with  dash  and  courage,  standing  up  boldly 
in  the  open  and  firing.  They  seemed  to  disdain 
cover,  and  their  somewhat  reckless  daring  won  the 
admiration  of  every  New  Zealander. 

Both  Sikhs  and  New  Zealanders  now  began  to  fall. 
A  lance-corporal  fell  wounded,  and  near  him  a 
sergeant-major  was  shot  through  the  head  and 
killed  instantly.  One  man  fell  wounded  in  the  arm 
and  the  chest,  and  a  corporal  who  went  to  his  assist- 
ance was  shot  through  the  body  while  undoing  his 
tunic,  and  died  at  once. 

Finally,  the  British  force  advanced  and  drove 
the  enemy  out  of  their  position  at  the  point  of  the 
bayonet,  chasing  them  away  behind  the  wells.  We 
captured  several  prisoners  and  camels.  A  number 
of  women  and  children  were  discovered  hiding  in 
the  caves.  The  Arabs  had  cut  the  throats  of  some 
of  their  wounded  camels  that  they  could  not  get 
away.  Our  men  counted  over  200  dead  of  the 
enemy ;  and  our  total  casualties  in  killed  and 
wounded,  including  the  Indians,  was  only  some 
sixty  or  seventy. 

The  section  of  the  Australian  Light  Horse  and 
some  of  the  English  Yeomanry  made  a  sweeping 
movement  on  the  left  flank.  They  lost  a  few 
men,  and  four  of  the  officers  were  wounded.  They 


THE   BLOODING   OF  THE   BATTALION     107 

killed  several  Senusi.  With  darkness,  the  enemy 
having  been  driven  off,  the  attack  ceased,  and  our 
men  and  the  Indians  marched  back  to  camp  singing. 
The  New  Zealanders  had  had  a  "  Merry  Christmas," 
and  they  thoroughly  enjoyed  it.  A  wounded  non- 
com,  said,  "  It  was  a  holiday,"  with  the  emphasis  on 
the  "  was."  "As  they  marched  back  in  the  night- 
time singing,"  he  added,  "  you  could  not  have 
wished  for  a  happier  crowd." 

And  ]  thus  it  was  that  the  new  battalion  fought 
its  first  fight.  They  have  travelled  far  and  fought 
in  other  fields  since  then  ;  but  those  who  survive  will 
always  look  back  with  interest  to  that  Christmas  Day 
and  the  Blooding  of  the  Battalion  on  the  North- 
western Frontier. 


ST.  PAUL'S   AND   THE  ABBEY 

AUGUST  4,  1915. 

TWELVE  thousand  miles  away,  in  New  Zealand, 
there  is  a  slate-roofed,  ivy-covered  college 
chapel,  where,  almost  a  year  ago,  every  seat  in 
chancel  and  nave  was  occupied  by  pupils  past  or 
present.  The  masters  in  hood  and  surplice,  the 
choir-boys  in  their  black  cassocks,  filled  the  back 
benches,  and  in  front  privates  and  officers  sang  for 
the  last  time  the  end-of-term  hymn  and  listened 
to  the  farewell  sermon.  These  men  were,  on  the 
eve  of  departure,  volunteers  going  without  question 
to  succour  a  land  that  most  of  them  had  never  seen. 

Then  the  scattering  of  all  shadows, 
And  the  end  of  toil  and  gloom. 

The  notes  echoed  in  the  chapel  rafters,  and  from 
the  lectern  the  hopeful  words  of  the  Benediction 
fell  on  the  bended  heads  of  the  men. 

Not  a  year  has  elapsed,  and  many  of  those  present 
that  evening  are  lying  in  nameless  graves  among  the 
dwarf  oaks  of  Gallipoli.  Yesterday,  one  of  those 
who  had  passed  through  the  Valley  of  the  Shadow 
heard  the  words  of  the  same  hymn  sung  beneath 

106 


ST.   PAUL'S  AND  THE  ABBEY        109 

the  dome  of  England's  greatest  Cathedral.  They 
awakened  sad  memories,  but  soon  the  majesty  of 
the  scene  and  service,  almost  oppressive  in  cere- 
monial grandeur,  filled  mind  and  eye.  Personal 
loss  and  pain  both  were  forgotten,  and,  in  their 
place,  came  a  sense  of  immeasurable  pride  and 
thankfulness,  pride  in  being  a  citizen  of  so  great  an 
Empire,  thankfulness  for  the  steadfast  courage  of 
England  in  her  dark  days. 

To  many  of  these  men  from  overseas  the  magnifi- 
cence and  solemnity  of  the  ceremony  was  over- 
whelming. To  them  all  the  pageantry  and  panoply 
that  pass  almost  unnoticed  in  a  great  Imperial  city 
were  strange.  The  intensity  of  their  patriotism, 
the  fervour  of  their  loyalty,  had  been  fostered  by  no 
such  outward  show.  So  it  was  that  the  splendour 
of  the  grand  old  church,  the  pealing  organ,  the 
angel-voices  that  soared  to  the  misty  roof,  the 
gathering  of  the  greatest  in  the  Empire,  formed 
never-to-be-forgotten  impressions  that  will  be 
handed  down  as  heirlooms.  Ignorant  of  Monarchy, 
the  New  Zealander  looked  almost  reverently  on  the 
khaki-clad  figure  of  him  for  whom  he  had  fought, 
well  content  with  the  quiet  dignity  that  gives  such 
confidence. 

The  National  Anthem,  which  now  means  so  much 
more  than  it  did  a  year  ago,  was  sung  with  thrilling 
fervour,  and  its  passionate  patriotism  and  loyalty 
must  have  in  some  measure  compensated  for  the 
anxieties  and  responsibilities  that  beset  a  throne. 

Midway  through  the  service,  as  the  Archbishop's 


no        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

fervent  prayer  arose,  a  ray  of  sunlight  flooded  the 
gloom,  striking  into  sudden  brightness  the  ring  on 
his  lifted  hand.  A  whisper  of  good  omen  was  heard 
as  the  shadows  fled  before  the  sunbeams.  God  grant 
that  it  may  be  so,  and  that  before  long  Prince  and 
people  may  again  meet  in  thanksgiving  for  a  peace 
which,  when  we  had  it,  we  did  not  value.  Never 
have  the  ties  of  Empire  been  so  close.  They  are 
cemented  with  the  life-blood  of  the  Colonies,  and 
the  King  rules  over  an  undivided  dominion — God 
save  the  King  ! 

APRIL  25,  1916. 

When  the  weary  Crusaders  came  back  from  the 
parched  plains  of  Syria  to  lay  aside  for  a  while  their 
dented  shields  they  rode  in  grand  array.  Lances 
twinkled  in  the  sun,  pennons  snapped  in  the  breeze, 
and  the  esquires  riding  behind  their  mailed  lords 
kept  eyes  aslant  to  the  flag-bedecked  scaffolding 
where  a  white  hand  sometimes  showed  favour.  On 
knight's  surtout  and  steed's  caparison  the  Red 
Cross  proclaimed  the  right,  and  keen  blades  and 
sharp  lances  vouched  fully  for  the  might. 

To-day  Londoners  saw  such  another  pageant, 
but  a  sadder  and  more  sombre,  in  which  the  note  of 
triumph  was  not  so  dominant.  And  yet  the  Tem- 
plars of  old  were  not  inspired  with  any  finer  spirit 
than  the  knights  of  this  latter-day  crusade.  Both 
had  upheld  the  Cross  against  the  Crescent. 

They  came  12,000  miles  to  fight  their  battle. 
Farmer,  clerk,  student,  and  labourer  heard  the 
Imperial  call,  and  heard  it  perhaps  more  clearly 


ST.   PAUL'S  AND  THE  ABBEY        in 

than  their  kin  "  at  home."  Some  made  their 
sacrifice  at  the  landing,  and  they  have  slept  for  a 
year  heedless  of  the  strife  around  them.  Others 
with  better  fortune  strove  through  the  long  months 
that  followed. 

And  yesterday  they  marched  proudly  through 
the  very  streets  that  centuries  ago  rang  to  the 
acclamations  of  the  populace  welcoming  back  the 
old  Crusaders.  In  the  faces  of  those  that  watched 
them  pass  they  saw  a  reward  for  all  their  sacrifices. 

There  was  a  sadder  procession  still.  One  that 
made  its  way  more  slowly  to  the  Abbey.  Here  a 
man  with  empty  sleeve  helped  a  limping  comrade 
to  his  seat.  There  one  pair  of  eyes  did  duty  for 
two.  These  were  they  who  were  unable  to  march 
with  the  others,  for  their  wounds  were  not  yet 
healed.  Some  of  them  were  but  wrecks  of  the 
strong  men  who  left  their  homes  in  October  two 
years  ago,  but  all  were  cheerful  in  the  sense  of  work 
well  done. 

A  year  ago  the  first  of  these  men  landed  on  the 
shore  of  Gallipoli.  It  was  a  fair  day,  and  the  blue 
waters  of  the  ^Egean  showed  scarcely  a  ripple. 
They  landed  with  battalions  1,000  strong.  Death, 
wounds,  and  disease  took  heavy  toll  as  the  long 
days  dragged  past,  and  many  a  man  laid  his  best 
friend  to  rest  among  the  stunted  oaks,  laboriously 
carving  a  cross  to  mark  the  sad  mound. 

Hell  Spit,  Shrapnel  Gully,  Quinn's  and  Courte- 
nay's,  all  have  become  memories,  but  memories  that 
haunt  waking  hours  and  hours  of  sleep  alike, 


ii2        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

memories  seared  in  the  brain.  To-day  in  the 
Abbey  these  wraiths  came  back  to  us,  and  for  a 
short  time  our  dead  lived  again.  Comrades  of  the 
trench  and  sap  passed  noiselessly  through  the  aisles 
gazing  wistfully  at  the  kneeling  soldiers. 

Heads  were  bowed  beneath  the  frayed  banners 
of  ancient  fields,  and  the  strong  voice  of  the  prea- 
cher echoed  through  the  fane,  and  echoing  found 
response  in  the  hearts  of  the  worshippers.  Kneeling 
with  them  and  with  them  in  heart  and  thought 
was  their  King,  whose  call  summoned  these  men 
across  the  world,  and  at  whose  bidding  will  come 
many  others  until  the  great  fight  is  won. 

Many  a  pageant  has  the  Abbey  seen,  but  never 
before  have  three  thousand  men  from  the  outskirts 
of  Empire  worshipped  with  their  King  in  its  storied 
pile.  The  service  had  a  climax  almost  oppressive 
in  its  sadness.  The  Australians  and  New  Zealanders 
turned  their  eyes  towards  the  altar  as  the  notes 
of  the  National  Anthem  echoed  through  the  Abbey. 
They  saw  there  the  simple  khaki-clad  figure  of  the 
only  man  in  our  Empire  who  does  not  stand  when 
the  Anthem  is  sung.  And  they  wondered-  what  he 
thought.  Surely  he  saw  as  they  did  that  every 
man  in  whose  company  he  worshipped  would  again  be 
willing  to  lay  down  his  life  to  uphold  his  sovereignty. 

The  service  closed  with  a  quiet  almost  uncanny, 
and  then  the  silver-throated  trumpets  rang  out  the 
soldier's  saddest  notes,  the  Last  Post.  I  do  not 
know  who  wrote  that  call,  but,  whoever  it  was, 
he  put  into  it  all  the  pathos,  all  the  hope  of  resurrec- 


ST.   PAUL'S  AND  THE  ABBEY       113 

tion,   and  all  the  triumph  that  man  knows.     It 
ended,  and  for  a  while  longer  there  was  silence. 

Three  thousand  men  trooped  out  of  the  Abbey, 
but  even  hi  so  short  a  time  had  a  change  been 
wrought.  Not  a  man  but  knew,  as  he  stepped  into 
the  warm  sunlight  again,  that  he  fought  for  the 
right.  On  us  all  in  that  half -hour  had  fallen  the 
mantle  of  our  fathers,  whosoe'er  they  were — baron, 
priest,  or  serf.  We  have  inherited  this  fair  land. 
And  for  such  a  heritage  will  we  gladly  give  our  all. 


OAK-APPLE  DAY 

"V^ESTERDAY  the  statue  of  King  Charles  at 
JL  Chelsea  Royal  Hospital  looked  out  of  a 
bower  of  greenery  at  a  scene  that  would  have 
surprised  the  amiable  original  of  Gibbons's  handi- 
work if  he  had  been  alive. 

It  was  Oak-apple  Day,  and,  as  has  been  the  custom 
for  many  years  past,  the  effigy  of  the  Royal  founder 
was  swathed  in  oak  branches  in  memory  of  the 
occasion  on  which  Charles  is  supposed  to  have 
hid  in  one  of  the  few  hundred  oaks  in  England 
to  which  the  legend  attaches.  To  the  pensioners 
the  day  is  marked  by  the  fact  that  the  Guards 
Band  plays  them  past  the  statue,  and  there  is  a 
large  plum  pudding  given  to  each  inmate.  Even 
these  old  men  have  felt  the  war,  and  whereas  in 
former  times  they  were  wont  to  get  four  puddings 
a  year,  they  now  get  only  two. 

The  day  was  a  glorious  one,  and  even  the  oldest 
and  most  rheumy  warrior  was  able  to  come  out  to 
sit  in  the  sunshine  and  hear  the  old  tunes  to  which 
he  had  once  marched.  Every  man  there  looked 
happy,  but  to  me  it  was  the  saddest  place  in  the 
world.  These  old  men  marched  past  the  Governor, 

114 


OAK-APPLE  DAY  115 

General  Sir  Neville  Lyttelton,  and  slowly  filed  by 
the  statue  of  the  Merry  Monarch.  If  Charles  had 
been  looking  out  from  the  branches  instead  of  his 
mere  presentiment  in  metal  he  would  have  seen 
the  pathos  of  the  scene.  There  was  one  fact  above 
all  others  that  made  the  sight  a  sad  one  and  it  was 
this.  These  old  soldiers  did  not  march  past  to 
the  jaunty  quick-step  of  their  more  active  days,  for 
old  limbs  and  stiffening  joints  do  not  permit  of  un- 
due hurry.  They  have  reached  the  stage  when  they 
do  not  hurry  even  for  parade,  and  the  slow  time 
of  a  waltz  is  sufficiently  fast  for  their  needs.  It  was 
to  a  waltz  that  they  marched  past !  And  then 
when  they  had  been  inspected  by  the  Governor  they 
gave  three  cheers  for  King  Charles,  their  benefactor. 
They  were  not  the  proverbial  ringing  cheers  of  the 
British  soldier.  After  sixty  years  and  more  the 
vocal  chords  do  not  respond  so  readily  to  the  call 
for  three  cheers,  and  more  than  one  pensioner  found 
that  he  was  left  coughing  after  the  effort. 

There  was  an  interesting  group  sitting  in  one 
corner  of  the  centre  quadrangle  and  the  conversation 
was  as  interesting  as  the  men  who  were  talking. 
There  were  four  soldiers  there  and  all  were  veterans, 
but  there  was  forty  years  between  their  ages  and 
their  campaigns.  Two  of  them  had  got  their 
honourable  wounds  in  the  Crimea  and  the  other 
two  at  Gallipoli.  The  two  old  heads  under  the 
tricorne  caps  wagged  wisely  as  tales  of  Anzac  were 
unfolded.  The  pensioners  knew  the  Turk,  and  they 
agreed  with  the  men  who  had  seen  him  "  at  home  " 


n6        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

forty  years  later  in  saying  that  he  fought  fair. 
Tales  of  the  bitter  Black  Sea  winter  found  their 
exact  parallel  when  one  of  the  New  Zealanders 
told  of  the  terrible  storm  that  raged  over  Anzac 
and  all  the  -^Egean.  But  for  the  fact  that  it  was  a 
young  voice  that  was  speaking  one  would  never 
have  known  that  it  was  not  still  the  pensioner 
narrating  his  experiences  of  the  winter  of  1855. 
It  was  a  wonderful  little  group,  symbolical  of  all 
that  Empire  stands  for,  and  when  the  old  men  rose 
to  go  indoors  and  the  young  one-armed  soldier  from 
the  Antipodes  helped  them  up  the  steps  to  the  clois- 
ters the  symbolism  was  carried  further  still.  The 
colouring  alone  would  have  justified  the  attention 
of  a  painter.  The  young  men,  in  their  blue  hospital 
kit,  the  old  men  in  scarlet,  the  faces  of  the  Anzacs 
bronzed  by  exposure  to  the  winds  and  sun  of  the 
Gallipoli  Peninsula,  and  the  pallor  of  old  age  of  the 
Crimean  veterans,  all  made  such  a  contrast  as 
Herkomer  would  have  delighted  to  paint.  In  the 
chapel  two  more  New  Zealanders  were  being  shown 
the  banners  that  were  carried  before  some  of  the 
finest  troops  the  world  has  ever  known.  They 
looked  at  them  reverently,  for  they  knew — none 
better — all  the  suffering  that  they  stood  for.  The 
old  man  thought  of  comrades  left  in  shallow  graves 
when  the  ground  was  too  hard  with  frost  to  dig 
deep,  and  the  younger  men  recalled  the  still  forms 
that  were  put  overside  from  the  hospital  ships  in 
the  JSgean,  or  buried  in  their  blankets  in  Shrapnel 
Gully. 


OAK-APPLE  DAY  117 

The  band  outside  in  the  sunshine  changed  its 
refrain,  and  a  rattling  of  side-drums  heralded  in  the 
best  of  all  marching  tunes,  "  The  British  Grena- 
diers," and  the  pensioner  sighed  softly  as  he  thought 
of  the  time  when  he  had  been  called  from  his  regi- 
ment by  the  Commander-in-Chief  and  publicly 
decorated  for  an  act  of  valour  that  had  won  him 
the  most  coveted  honour  that  a  soldier  may  win. 
The  march  stopped  with  the  same  rolling  of  drums 
with  which  it  began,  and  then,  as  the  strains  of  the 
National  Anthem  followed,  the  trio  in  the  chapel 
stiffened  to  attention.  Again  it  was  symbolical. 
Here  was  one  of  England's  oldest  warriors,  and  beside 
him  two  of  her  youngest.  No  one  has  painted  the 
picture,  but  let  us  hope  that  it  will  last  for  all  time 
and  that  the  call  will  always  be  answered  from 
overseas.  As  the  younger  men  stood  beside  the  old 
soldier,  who  had  long  ago  laid  away  his  sabre,  so 
will  the  young  Dominions  stand  beside  the  land  that 
gave  them  birth. 


THE  MAN  WITH  THE  FEARLESS 
EYES 

MY  sister,  Lady  Beverly  Brooke,  has  a  new 
hobby.  She  has  just  given  up  Buddhism. 
The  coffee-coloured  high  priest  who  held  seances 
and  hands  in  her  drawing-room  became  acquisitive 
and  forgot  that  the  tenets  of  his  religion  only  bade 
him  acquire  merit.  He  acquired  some  of  her  best 
old  silver,  and  when  he  was  found  leaving  the  house 
with  a  cloisonne  vase  beneath  his  ample  robes  she 
decided  that  Buddhism  did  not  quite  supply  the 
meditative  influence  that  she  desired.  Her  new 
recreation  is  taking  out  wounded  colonial  soldiers. 
She  visits  the  various  hospitals  and  insists  that 
she  shall  be  allowed  to  take  out  the  wildest  and 
wooliest  men  from  the  back-blocks  that  happen 
to  be  in  at  the  moment. 

I  went  with  her  on  Saturday  last.  We  saw  the 
matron  at  the  first  hospital  we  called  at,  and  she 
was  sorry,  but  there  were  only  tame  and  sophisti- 
cated men  in  her  wards,  so  we  went  elsewhere.  At 
last  we  found  a  place  where  there  was  a  man  who 
had  never  been  loose  in  London  except  on  his  way 

118 


THE  MAN  WITH  THE  FEARLESS  EYES    119 

from  Victoria  in  a  motor  ambulance.  It  seemed 
too  good  to  be  true  and  my  sister  was  sceptical. 
"  Are  you  sure  that  he  is  just  what  I  want  and  really 
new  to  towns  ?  "  she  asked.  "  I  want  one  of  those 
fine  rugged  men  who  have  lived  close  to  nature 
all  their  lives  and  are  unspoiled  by  the  contamina- 
tion of  modern  society.  I  want  to  take  him  round 
London  and  listen  to  his  appreciation  of  all  its 
wonders."  The  matron  assured  her  that  the  man 
was  just  like  that  and  went  to  bring  him  down. 
She  went  down  the  corridor,  and  presently  we  saw 
her  talking  to  a  man  in  uniform.  r'  That  is  the 
man/'  said  Evelyn  excitedly.  "  Look  at  his  wea- 
ther-tanned face  and  his  easy  walk.  That  comes 
from  tramping  the  open  spaces.  Isn't  he  wonder- 
ful ?  "  Then  the  matron  came  back  to  tell  us  that 
the  man  would  be  down  in  a  minute.  "  How  splen- 
did he  looks  !  "  said  Evelyn  enthusiastically. 
"  Who  ?  "  asked  the  matron.  "  Why,  that  great 
strong  colonial  boy,"  said  Evelyn.  "  That's  not  a 
colonial,"  said  the  matron,  "  that's  Mr.  Smith, 
of  Harley  Street,  the  great  aurist.  He  comes  here 
twice  a  week."  Then  Evelyn  started  to  talk 
rapidly  of  the  flower  show  and  the  last  Zeppelin 
raid.  Presently  our  man  did  come  downstairs. 
I  must  say  I  was  disappointed,  but  Evelyn  was 
quite  satisfied.  As  he  was  getting  his  pass  she 
whispered  to  me  to  notice  his  fearless  blue  eye. 
This  she  also  attributed  to  living  in  the  open  spaces. 
She  also  drew  attention  to  his  firm  mouth,  which 
she  said  was  formed  as  the  result  of  dealing  with 


120        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

nature's  moods,  probably  with  the  arduous  diffi- 
culties of  the  trail  to  the  gold  mines,  and  the  strenu- 
ous and  thrilling  work  of  the  round  up  of  the  cattle 
on  the  great  prairies. 

We  took  him  to  Kensington  Gardens  first.  He 
was  shy  and  did  not  talk  very  much.  Presently  he 
asked  if  he  could  smoke  and  Evelyn  had  the  chance 
she  had  been  waiting  for.  She  presented  him  with 
a  twist  of  the  darkest  tobacco  I  have  ever  seen  and 
a  new  corn  cob  pipe  !  He  seemed  a  little  taken 
aback,  but  she  would  not  be  gainsaid.  "  I  know 
you  men  from  the  ranches  smoke  this  sort  of  to- 
bacco/1 she  said,  "  and  you  would  not  look  at  all 
at  home  with  an  ordinary  pipe."  He  took  the  pipe 
and  filled  it  and  for  a  time  he  smoked  in  silence. 
"  I  do  wish  he  would  spit,"  whispered  Evelyn  to  me, 
"  I  am  sure  he  wants  to."  If  he  did  he  was  too 
polite  to  do  it  and  she  was  disappointed.  Presently 
we  came  to  the  statue  of  Peter  Pan.  "  That,"  said 
Evelyn,  "  is  Barrie's  Peter  Pan."  Then  the  big 
New  Zealander  spoke.  "  I  didn't  know  Barry  had 
any  kids,"  he  said,  "  but  he's  a  fine  sculler.  Saw 
him  row  against  Arnst  on  the  Wanganui  once." 

Evelyn  was  evidently  at  a  loss,  so  I  explained 
matters.  "  It's  not  the  Barrie  who  rows,"  I  said. 
"  It's  the  novelist."  "  Oh  !  "  said  the  New  Zea- 
lander. 

We  went  past  the  Round  Pond  and  along  a 
shaded  walk.  Presently  I  saw  the  New  Zealander, 
who  had  got  slightly  ahead,  crouched  close  to  the 
ground,  every  muscle  tense,  like  a  leopard  about  to 


THE  MAN  WITH  THE  FEARLESS  EYES    121 

spring.  I  thought  he  was  ill  and  ran  to  him. 
"  Shhh,"  he  whispered.  "  Keep  quiet.  Can't  you 
see  it  ?  "  I  said  I  could  see  nothing  out  of  the  or- 
dinary. "  It's  a  rabbit,"  he  hissed.  Then  he 
crawled  nearer  and  I  picked  out  a  very  surprised 
bunny  peering  through  the  bushes  at  us.  Such 
things  were  new  to  the  sophisticated  park  rabbit 
and  with  two  blase  hops  he  dived  into  a  burrow. 
"  Run  and  get  the  boss,"  said  the  man,  now  more 
excited  than  ever,  "I've  got  his  burrow  marked 
down."  "  There  is  no  boss  here,"  I  said  placatingly. 
"  Then  get  the  man  who  owns  this  place,"  he  said 
"  The  King  owns  it,"  I  explained.  At  last  I  per- 
suaded him  to  get  up,  but  he  was  still  far  from 
happy.  "  Hasn't  he  got  a  rabbiter  ?  "  he  asked. 
"  Doesn't  he  know  there  are  rabbits  in  this  pad- 
dock ?  "  "  Isn't  he  too  delicious,"  cooed  Evelyn, 
"  and  so  colonial.  Just  fancy  a  Rabbiter-in- 
Ordinary  to  the  King.  Who  could  we  give  the 
position  to  ?  It  would  be  just  like  another  Chan- 
cellorate  of -the  Duchy." 

By  this  "time  I  was  near  a  state  of  collapse,  but 
Evelyn  was  as  a  ticket  office  man  who  has  been 
given  half  a  sovereign  for  a  sixpence  and  about 
as  willing  to  give  up  her  find.  He  calmed  down  a 
bit,  but  when  we  got  to  the  Row  he  surveyed  a 
squadron  of  women  in  the  latest  divided  skirts  with 
great  wonder.  "  Where's  the  circus  ?  "  he  said 
seriously  and  in  a  loud  aside  as  one  lady  in  neat 
riding  breeches  walked  her  horse  past  close  to  the 
railings.  Near  Albert  Gate  we  met  Lady  Broke 


122        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

with  the  Duchesse  de  Cri  Nisi.  Of  course  Evelyn 
took  her  Tommy  up  to  show  him  off.  He  chummed 
up  directly  with  Lady  Broke.  "  Do  you  know  the 
King  ?  "  he  asked.  "  Well,  I  have  met  him/'  she 
said  mystified.  "Well,"  he  said,  •"  you  tell  him 
from  me  that  he  has  rabbits  in  that  big  paddock 
back  there." 

We  got  him  away  at  last,  but  not  before  Angela 
Broke  had  been  made  to  promise  that  she  would 
write  the  King  a  note  or  "  Perhaps  call  round  on 
Sunday  and  tell  him  he  had  rabbits." 

All  this  was  six  days  ago.  Last  night  I  went 
to  Betty  Holloway's  to  a  small  dance.  It  was 
very  hot  and  rather  crowded,  so  I  sat  down  in  the 
smoking-room  and  amused  myself  watching  the 
dancing  through  the  open  door.  Opposite  me  was 
a  youth  of  elegant  appearance.  He  was  large  and 
handsome,  with  a  tanned  face  and  blue  eyes.  His 
dress  suit  was  faultless  and  looked  like  one  of  those 
garments  that  never  seem  to  appear  except  on 
tailors'  advertisements.  Languidly  he  poured  him- 
self a  whisky  and  soda,  fitted  a  cigarette  to  a  six- 
inch  amber  tube,  and  then  winked  solemnly  at  me. 
"  Did  Lady  Broke  give  my  message  to  the  King 
about  the  rabbits  ?  "  he  asked.  Then  I  remem- 
bered him.  "  But,"  I  gasped,  "  you  aren't,  you 
can't  be,  it's  too  absurd."  "  Don't  you  wish  I 
would  spit  ?  "  he  said  in  a  stage  whisper.  As  he 
went  off  to  join  his  next  partner  he  stopped  for  a 
moment.  "  I  am  sorry,"  he  said,  "  but  I  couldn't 
resist  it.  We  had  a  great  afternoon,  didn't  we  ?  " 


THE  MAN  WITH  THE  FEARLESS  EYES    123 

Then  I  sought  out  Betty.  "  Who  is  that  young 
New  Zealander  ?  "  I  asked.  "  Oh  he's  not  really 
a  New  Zealander  at  all,"  she  said ;  "  he  just  happened 
to  be  in  New  Zealand  when  war  broke  out.  He  was 
deer  stalking  with  his  uncle,  dear  Lord  Bowinda,  and 
he  joined  up  as  a  private." 

"  Can  I  use  your  telephone  ?  "  I  asked. 

"  Is  anything  wrong." 

"  Oh  no,"  I  reassured  her,  "  I've  some  news  for 
Evelyn." 


LONDON  GHOSTS 

AS  the  devout  Arab  goes  to  Mecca,  so  have  I 
come  to  London.  I  have  come  to  pay 
homage  to  a  city  and  to  the  ghosts  of  the  past  that 
people  it.  Far  off,  on  the  underneath  part  of  the 
globe,  I  dreamed  of  London,  and  my  dreams  were 
queer  ones.  My  picture  was  a  conglomerate  of 
Dickens  and  Pepys,  of  the  Spectator  and  the  Tatler. 
Added  to  this  was  the  stalwart  figure  of  a  London 
policeman.  In  the  background  a  Phil  May  coster 
girl's  ostrich  feathers  waved  coquettishly. 

And  now  I  have  seen  London,  and  I  have  spent 
months  in  the  vain  attempt  to  sort  out  and  pigeon- 
hole impressions  that  crowd  each  other  so  close  that 
they  serve  me  little  better  than  my  far-away 
conception  gleaned  from  Pepys  and  Dickens. 

I  came  to  London  on  a  dull  day,  with  the  spires 
and  domes  showing  up  uncertainly  through  the  soft 
rain.  I  passed  through  Whitehall  and  Westminster, 
and  I  looked  out  at  the  sooted,  grimy  Palace  and  the 
great  Abbey,  feeling  that  somehow  none  of  it  was 
new  to  me.  Later  I  visited  these  places  again,  and 
my  first  thoughts  were  confirmed  for  me.  You  here 

124 


LONDON  GHOSTS  125 

in  England  do  not  know  all  the  world  of  meaning  in 
the  word  heredity.  It  seems  to  you  almost  incon- 
ceivable that  a  man  can  come  from  a  small  Oversea 
Dominion  to  this  great  city  and  fit  automatically  into 
the  places  his  forefathers  filled.  But  it  is  so. 

I  had  thought  to  see  St.  Paul's  great  pile  gleaming 
in  the  sun  in  all  the  splendour  of  white  stonework 
and  masonry.  Instead  I  saw  it  through  a  mist,  and 
it  was  befouled  and  sooted  and  grimed  from  smoke 
and  fogs.  Then  I  knew  that  therein  lay  its  beauty. 
Wren  had  no  hand  in  all  this.  One  doubts  whether 
he  foresaw  it,  but  in  those  great  stone  columns  and 
massive  cornices  the  dirt  and  smoke  of  centuries  have 
worked  a  miracle  of  light  and  shade.  Reliefs  are 
made  to  stand  out  amazingly,  the  great  flat  walls 
are  softened  and  marbled  in  greys  and  blacks.  In 
places,  in  striking  contrast,  the  rain  has  washed  the 

stones  and  kept  them  white. 

***** 

If  you  live  in  a  country  that  to  the  white  man  is 
but  fifty  years  old,  and  then  come  suddenly  to  a  city 
where  you  find  the  dust  of  ages,  it  oppresses  you.  It 
seems  wonderful  to  think  that  you  can  touch  an 
altar  rail  that  was  set  in  the  stone  floor  six  centuries 
ago  ;  that  you  can  kneel  at  a  shrine  where  the 
Templars  prayed ;  can  walk  on  a  terrace  where 
Raleigh  smoked  tobacco  from  his  own  Virginia.  I 
have  seen  the  tombs  of  the  Kings  at  Thebes,  the 
great  pyramids  of  Gizeh,  the  mosque  of  Sultan 
Hassan — all  these  go  back  to  ages  in  which  London 
was  perhaps  unthought  of.  And  that  is  precisely 


126        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

where  they  lose  all  their  impressiveness.  So  old  are 
they  that  one  cannot  people  them  with  the  men  and 
women  who  lived  at  their  building.  Here  it  is 
different.  It  is  not  a  great  Abbey  that  you  marvel 
at.  It  is  the  thought  that  you  can  re-people  it  in  any 
age  to  suit  yourself.  Here  are  fretted  archways, 
flying  buttresses,  lofty  spires,  all  of  them  things  of 
beauty  in  themselves,  but  think  of  them  in  the 
making  !  Think  of  the  raw  stone  for  the  arch  under 
the  chisel  of  the  carver,  and  the  spire  still  masked  in 
scaffolding  to  which  figures  in  mediaeval  costume 
carry  these  carven  blocks  to  set  them  in  their  places. 
Think  of  Westminster  with  its  tonsured  monks  and 
its  gowned  novices.  Think  of  that  high  window  in 
Whitehall  on  that  day  when  a  King  stepped  from  it 
to  the  scaffold  above  the  silent,  awed  crowds.  Always 
it  is  the  same.  In  Holyrood,  in  Edinburgh,  a  little 
wainscoted  room  would  have  no  meaning  to  the  man 
who  did  not  know  the  story  of  Rizzio.  When  that 
is  told  the  past  returns.  It  is  the  same  in  London. 
What  matters  if  you  watch  the  twopences  ticking  up 
on  a  taxi  clock  as  you  go  to  the  Tower  ?  When  you 
uncover  as  you  enter  St.  John's  Chapel  all  that  is 
blotted  out  by  the  mist  of  years,  and  you  see  in  the 
half-light  the  kneeling  figure  of  the  Conqueror,  in 
mail  and  white  surtout,  praying  for  this  realm.  And 
the  accents  of  others  in  the  Chapel  seem  to  be  the 
voices  of  the  Norman  priests  droning  their  credos 
and  their  paters.  Almost  one  smells  the  incense 
from  swinging  censers. 

The  sound  of  mellow  bells  steals  through  the 


LONDON  GHOSTS  127 

narrow  windows,  and  outside  you  hear  the  footsteps 
of  armed  men,  the  stamp  of  caparisoned  war-horses 
as  the  Conqueror's  knights  gather  to  offer  thanks  for 
past  victory  or  pray  for  the  success  of  fresh  ventures. 
What  does  it  matter  that  the  benches  are  unoc- 
cupied and  the  altar  is  bare  of  vessels  of  silver  and 
gold  ?  In  the  still  hours  of  the  night  all  these 
ghosts  return,  and  there  is  the  slow  chant  of  voices, 
the  splash  of  holy  water  as  the  stone  stoop  is  filled, 
the  rustle  of  the  vellum  leaves  of  the  ponderous 
missals,  the  tinkle  of  coins  into  the  alms  boxes. 

This  is  London,  a  city  of  ghosts  that  will  stay  for 
all  time. 


MEN  OF  THE  GLEN 


is  a  kindly  wind  blowing  from  over  the 
JL  loch.  It  comes  stealing  down  from  the 
slopes  of  Ben  Donich,  ruffles  the  still  water  in  frosted 
patches,  and  creeps  through  the  castle  policies, 
telling  the  great  oaks  something  that  keeps  them 
whispering  all  the  morn.  The  little  town  seems 
sleeping.  The  plash  of  the  brown  waters  over  the 
weir  beneath  the  castle  bridge  fills  the  ears.  A  heron 
stands  motionless  in  the  shallow  water,  surfeited 
with  the  full  meal  he  has  just  finished.  Then  from 
the  direction  of  the  town  there  comes  the  sound  of  a 
drum.  If  we  draw  nearer  we  will  see  why  it  is  that 
the  loch-side  is  deserted.  In  the  church  square  some 
200  kilted  lads  are  saying  a  farewell  to  their  sisters 
and  mothers  and  other  peoples'  sisters  and  mothers, 
for  they  are  marching  to  the  wars,  as  their  forefathers 
have  done  before  them  from  time  immemorial. 

This  little  hamlet  has  sent  men  to  every  war  that 
Britain  has  engaged  in,  and  no  matter  how  far  back 
you  go,  every  onfall,  siege,  leaguer,  every  brawl 
between  nations  has  seen  Mac-Cailein  Mor's  men 
well  in  the  forefront  of  battle.  And  so  it  is  that 

128 


MEN  OF  THE  GLEN  129 

these  men  have  left  the  loch-side  and  the  brae,  have 
left  the  fishing  boat  on  the  beach,  and  the  sheep 
without  a  shepherd. 

The  last  good-byes  are  being  said,  and  a  girl  with 
eyes  as  blue  as  the  waters  of  the  loch  on  a  summer's 
day,  calls  to  her  brother,  a  tall  piper.  "  See  and  no 
forget  to  pipe  to  they  Germans,"  she  says,  "  and 
look  after  Sandy  for  me.  I'm  feared  he'll  be  led 
away  by  yon  French  lassies."  A  corporal  answers 
her,  "  I'll  look  after  mysel'  fine,"  and  he  kisses  the 
girl  and  rejoins  his  ranks. 

The  officer  in  charge  of  the  company  gives  a 
warning,  and  the  men  hoist  their  web  slings  over 
their  shoulders.  The  pipers  form  up  in  front  of  the 
column,  and  as  they  move  off  they  toss  the  drone 
and  the  stocs  of  the  pipes  on  to  the  hollow  of  their 
shoulders.  There  is  a  chorus  of  farewells  broken 
into  by  the  wheeze  of  the  filling  bags  and  the  buzz  of 
the  great  drones.  The  drum  beats  on  the  setting 
down  of  each  left  foot,  and  away  they  go  with  cap 
ribbons  fluttering  in  the  breeze,  sporrans  a-swing  to 
the  step.  The  drum  rolls  and  the  glen  is  wakened 
as  it  has  been  many  times  in  the  past  with  the  lilt  of 
one  of  the  finest  marches  that  ever  burst  from  the 
chanter,  "  Baile  lonaraora  "  it  is,  better  known  to 
you  as  "  The  Campbells  are  Coming."  Round  the 
town  front  and  past  the  old  inn  and  the  great  stone- 
arched  gates,  to  the  castle  walls  where  the  pipers 
change  their  tune  to  the  salute,  "  Failte  'Mharcuis." 
By  the  burying  ground  they  step  out  to  the  march 
once  more,  and  until  they  are  over  the  humpbacked 

K 


130        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

bridge  the  tune  continues.  It  stops  with  a  sad  little 
gasp  as  the  bags  deflate  and  are  tucked  under  each 
oxter  with  the  stoc  ribbons  to  the  fore,  fluttering 
their  dark  blue,  yellow-striped  tartan  ribbons. 

Suddenly  a  man  in  the  front  four  breaks  into  song. 
His  clear  voice  echoes  back  to  the  listening  women 
by  the  inn  : — 

The  Rover  o'  Lochryan,  he's  gane 

Wi'  his  merry  men  sae  brave  ; 

Their  hearts  are  o'  steel,  an'  a  better  keel 

Ne'er  bowl'd  owre  the  back  o'  a  wave. 

It's  no  when  the  loch  lies  dead  in  its  trough, 

When  naething  disturbs  it  ava, 

But  the  rack  and  the  ride  o'  the  restless  tide, 

An'  the  splash  o'  the  grey  sea-maw. 

Under  the  shadow  of  the  hill  the  wind  steals  the 
song  and  carries  it  away  and  up  the  glen,  but  as  the 
road  crosses  a  tongue  that  juts  into  the  lake  it  is 
still  borne  faintly  down  to  the  listening  women. 

We  dash  through  the  drift  and  sing  to  the  lift 
O'  the  wave  that  heaves  us  on. 

From  the  crags  under  the  beacon  it  is  repeated 
wistfully,  "  The  wave  that  heaves  us  on."  The 
light  goes  and  the  lamps  are  lit  in  the  cottages  along 
the  front.  The  tall  girl  who  was  anxious  about 
Sandy  is  the  last  to  leave.  She  shades  her  eyes 
with  her  hand  and  looks  again,  listening  the  while, 
and  down  the  winding  waters,  "  the  trough  o'  the 
loch,"  there  comes  the  ghost  of  a  melody.  But  the 
wind  is  fickle  and  it  stays  but  a  moment.  The  girl 


MEN  OF  THE  GLEN  131 

turns  and  goes  into  a  cottage  near  at  hand.    "  You'll 
no'  be  wantin'  the  light  yet  a  while,  mither,"  she 

says,  and  the  old  woman  agrees. 

***** 

The  seasons  have  changed  the  leaves  in  the  glen 
as  the  yellow  St.  John's  wort  changes  the  wool  for 
the  tartan  of  the  Lachlans.  There  are  no  young 
men  left  in  the  town.  There  are  but  old  men  and 
women  and  the  sturdy  youngsters  fretting  that  they 
might  too  be  allowed  to  go  to  the  wars.  The  blue- 
eyed  girl  waits  on  the  jetty  for  a  steamer  that  is  as 
yet  ten  miles  down  the  loch.  She  knows  this,  but 
she  must  wait  here.  At  last  a  puff  of  smoke  heralds 
the  approach  of  the  little  boat  that  soon  afterwards 
creeps  round  the  promontory.  As  it  ties  up  at  the 
jetty  the  girl  sees  two  kilted  figures  on  the  deck. 
She  sees  them  through  a  mist  of  tears,  for  one  man, 
her  brother,  has  an  empty  sleeve.  And  yet  he  is 
the  luckier  of  the  two,  for  he  helps  the  other  man  to 
the  gangway,  putting  his  hands  on  the  side  rails. 
ft  Twa  steps,  Sandy/'  he  warns  him,  but  the  blind 
man  is  safe  at  last,  and  softer  hands  have  helped 
him  on  to  the  quay. 

"  I  didna'  see  much  o'  they  French  lassies,  Alison," 
says  he  bravely,  "  for  it  was  dark  when  they  took 
us  through  to  the  front,  and  when  I  came  back  it  was 
dark,  too,  leastways  it  was  for  me."  "  Oh,  Sandy, 
Sandy,"  cries  the  girl,  and  Sandy  knows  that  the 
splash  of  wet  on  his  hand  is  not  from  the  rain  that 
has  been  threatening  for  the  last  hour.  So  these 
three  go  up  the  little  street  to  the  cottage  where  a 


132        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

very  old  lady  meets  them.  "  Come  ben  the  hoose, 
and  we'll  just  have  prayers/'  is  all  she  says  when  she 
has  stepped  from  the  one-armed  embrace  of  her  son. 
And  the  four  of  them  kneel  and  offer  thanks. 

Put  the  scene  back  a  hundred  years  to  the  "  Forty- 
five  "  or  back  further  still,  and  there  is  nothing  new 
in  it.  Think  it  out  for  yourself,  and  ask  what  it  is 
that  brings  these  men  of  the  heather  and  the  glen  to 
fight  for  England.  They  have  been  treated  as 
outlaws,  hunted  and  slain.  Their  dress  and  their 
music  were  forbidden  them,  their  very  language  was 
proscribed  so  that  it  was  a  crime  to  speak  it.  And 
yet — and  yet  the  music  of  the  piob-mhor  echoes 
over  the  fields  of  Flanders  and  the  deserts  of  Egypt, 
through  the  ruined  colonnades  of  Grecian  temples, 
and  is  even  heard  in  the  African  jungle. 


THE  HOME  OF  MY  FATHERS 

THERE  "comes  a  stage  in  convalescence  when  a 
man  gets  wilful  and  can  stay  still  no  longer. 
And  so,  not  heeding  the  doctor,  I  set  off  for  Scotland 
and  found  myself  in  due  course  at  the  little  village 
of  Tarbet  that  fronts  Ben  Lomond  on  the  other  side 
of  the  loch. 

There  I  found  great  pleasure  in  the  stern  hills  and 
the  curving  beaches,  but  I  wanted  something  more. 
I  had  come  from  the  Antipodes  to  the  home  of  my 
fathers,  and  I  wanted  to  find  out  for  myself  what  it 
was  in  this  place  that  always  tugs  at  the  heart  strings 
of  the  Scot  be  he  never  so  far  away.  Apart  from 
reading,  all  I  knew  of  Scotland  I  had  learnt  from 
my  grandfather,  a  Scot  of  Scots,  who  only  spoke 
English  because  the  Sassenachs  amongst  whom  he 
had  settled  did  not  understand  the  tongue  of  the 
Highlands. 

Something  of  this  I  told  to  a  chance  acquaintance, 
and  he  prescribed,  "  Walk  from  here  to  Loch  Long 
and  over  the  Pass  of  Glencroe  to  Inveraray.  Take 
your  time  and  avoid  the  trains.  They  spoil  the 
Highlands."  "  I  will,"  I  said,  and  I  did. 

133 


134        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

I  left  Loch  Lomond  behind  me  and  walked  at  my 
ease  over  the  brae  to  Arrochar  and  so  round  the 
silver  waters  of  Loch  Long,  where  once  the  Vikings 
had  sailed  their  ships  before  the  fight  at  Largs  saw 
them  sent  their  ways.  The  road  winds  dusty  white 
round  the  shore  to  the  Pass  of  Glencroe,  and  up 
through  the  pines  to  the  saddle  of  the  hills  at  Rest 
and  Be  Thankful.  I  rose  above  the  burn  that 
became  as  a  winding  glinting  thread  below,  until  I 
overtook  an  old  crone,  bent  as  a  wind-warped  tree- 
trunk.  We  walked  together  silently  to  the  Rest  and 
sat  to  take  breath  amongst  the  sweet  heather.  The 
climb  had  been  hard  to  the  old  dame,  but  she  sud- 
denly asked  me  a  question  when  her  lungs  had 
rested  themselves.  At  least  I  was  in  two  minds 
whether  it  was  a  question  or  a  statement  of  fact. 
"  You'll  not  be  from  these  parts  ?  "  she  said  abruptly. 
I  told  her  that  I  came  from  the  other  side  of  the 
world,  and  that  this  was  my  first  pilgrimage  to  this 
country.  "  Aye,"  she  said,  "  I  ken  that  fine,  but 
your  fathers  were  here  and  this  is  as  much  your 
country  as  it  was  theirs.  Look  down  the  glen  there 
and  tell  me  whether  it's  new  to  you." 


So  I  looked,  and  as  I  did  so  the  purple  mists  of 
the  early  spring  evening  gathered  and  massed,  and 
the  strip  of  white  that  was  the  stream  faded  away 
for  a  while.  It  cleared  again,  and  I  saw  that  the 
road  had  become  narrow.  It  was  no  more  broad 
and  white,  but  a  rough  path  that  skirted  the  great 


THE  HOME  OF  MY  FATHERS         135 

boulders  and  climbed  short  steep  faces  with  varying 
grades.  Far  down  below  me  the  peat  reek  curled 
lazily  upwards  in  wreaths  and  rings  until  I  could 
smell  its  sweet  savour  in  the  clear  air.  At  the  door 
of  the  shieling  from  whence  the  smoke  came  there 
was  a  splash  of  colour,  brilliant  red  even  in  the 
subdued  light,  and  it  came  to  me  suddenly  that  I 
was  there  to  watch  the  men  who  wore  those  red 
jackets.  So  I  lay  very  close  to  the  ground  with  my 
head  low  in  the  heather  and  my  bonnet  in  my  hand. 
From  high  above  me  there  came  the  soft  cry  of  the 
mating  whaup,  three  times  repeated,  and  I  answered 
it  with  the  same  notes  twice.  I  thought  it  not 
strange  that  as  I  lay  I  should  pull  my  sporran  from 
under  me  and  find  in  it  a  wad  of  oaten  bannock  and 
a  lump  of  white  crowdy  wrapped  in  a  cabbage  leaf. 
I  munched  hungrily,  always  with  one  eye  lifted  for 
the  redcoats  at  the  cottage  door.  Presently  the 
red  splay  became  a  straight  line  which  then  curved 
as  it  wound  up  the  hill.  I  gave  the  whaup 's  cry 
again,  and  for  answer  there  came  a  rustling  of  the 
heather  at  my  side  as  a  bearded  face  and  a  shock  of 
red  hair  came  level  with  my  shoulder. 

I  greeted  the  new-comer  in  the  Gaelic,  nor  thought 
it  strange,  though  I  had  never  known  the  tongue, 
nor,  indeed,  had  my  father,  unless  one  take  account 
of  the  few  words  that  any  one  would  glean  from  mere 
listening.  The  red  fellow  gave  my  name  in  the 
Gaelic,  and  we  talked  in  whispers  in  that  speech, 
and  all  the  time  the  red  ribbon  wound  farther  up  the 
mountain-side  until  at  last  it  ceased  to  be  a  ribbon 


136        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

at  all,  and  we  could  count  the  ten  men  who  toiled 
under  their  knapsacks,  led  by  an  officer,  who  walked 
alone.  How  hot  the  captain  looked,  although  he 
carried  nothing  but  a  light  sword  !  I  wondered  at 
this,  for  I  had  come  the  same  gait  many  a  time,  and 
never  so  much  as  a  bead  of  sweat  had  come  to  my 
brow.  Now  they  were  below  us,  and  I  leaned  out 
and  over  the  heather  tuft  that  I  might  see  the  better. 
As  I  did  a  stone  rolled  from  beneath  my  foot  and 
crashed  through  the  stems  towards  the  men  below. 
My  companion  leapt  like  a  deer  and  ran  upwards, 
bent  double  to  keep  below  the  musket  balls  that 
whipped  the  branches  from  the  twigs  on  either  side 
of  him.  I  saw  his  drab  hosen  and  bare  knees  go 
flitting  over  the  brae-top,  and  I  bethought  me  that 
perhaps  it  were  better  if  I  ran  too,  for  the  leading 
four  of  the  soldiers  was  a  bare  ten  yards  below  me 
climbing  fast  for  all  their  accoutrements.  Picking 
up  a  stone  I  threw  it  with  all  my  might,  thanking 
my  father  the  while  that  he  had  skilled  me  in  such 
games.  I  saw  it  hurtle  through  the  air  and  strike  a 
man's  face,  which  became  on  the  instant  redder 
than  his  coat,  but  without  any  of  the  shape  that  a 
man's  face  should  have.  Then  I  lifted  my  brogues 
and  footed  it  up  the  hill-side,  the  wind  fanning  my 
face  with  the  speed  I  ran  at.  From  behind  again 
came  the  sputter  of  musket  shots,  and  I  felt  as 
though  a  hand  of  steel  had  torn  the  calf  from  my 
leg  and  had  smote  me  full  in  the  ribs.  I  ran  on  and 
ever  upwards,  and  at  last  the  sound  of  the  voices 
grew  fainter.  Where  the  heather  was  thickest  I 


THE  HOME  OF  MY  FATHERS       137 

found  two  great  stones  propped  together  with  a 
hollow  between.  I  pushed  myself  in  feet  first,  and 
next  I  woke  to  see  the  wan  dawnlight  coming  over 
the  hills.  I  tried  to  pull  myself  from  the  cranny, 
but  it  hurt  me  sorely,  and  I  stopped. 


And  the  mists  came  down  in  the  Pass  of  Glencroe 
again,  and  there  was  the  road  broad  and  white,  no 
longer  a  path.  There  was  no  smoking  chimney 
below  for  the  cottage  was  roofless.  There  were  no 
redcoats  either.  The  only  thing  left  me  was  a 
stabbing  pain  in  the  side  and  in  the  leg,  but  I  knew 
that  was  from  a  wound  that  I  got  at  Gallipoli  in 
April  last  year. 

"  I  have  been  sleeping,"  I  said  to  the  old  woman 
who  still  sat  by  me,  "  and  dreaming,  too."  "  Maybe, 
maybe,"  she  said,  "  but  they  were  nae  your  ain 
dreams.  Come  you  with  me." 

She  led  me  over  the  hill  and  up  away  from  the 
road  past  two  great  stones  with  a  hollow  between 
them  such  as  a  man  might  hide  in.  We  went  on, 
and  there  on  the  lonely  hill-side  was  a  graveyard 
with  a  score  of  stones  set  all  agley,  with  the  moss  so 
thick  on  them  that  it  was  not  easy  to  read  the  letter- 
ing. She  led  me  to  one  of  them  and  rubbed  the 
green  from  the  inscription,  and  I  found  myself 
staring  at  my  own  name.  I  read  plainly,  "  To  the 
memory  of  Alexander  Ross,  who  was  shotte  hardbye 
this  place  by  soldiers  of  the  English,  but  who  lived 
seven  months  afterward,  although  he  carried  his 


138        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

wound  to  the  grave  and  his  hate  with  it.  Decem  : 
15,  17 — ."  That  was  all. 

"  And  what  might  your  name  be,  now  ?  "  asked  the 
old  woman.  I  told  her  shortly,  for  the  thing  amazed 
me.  "  There  were  lots  of  your  folk  here  at  one  time, 
although  they  did  not  properly  belong  to  these  parts. 
They  buried  here,  and  they  say  that  yon  cottage  has 
had  nae  a  roof  tae  it  this  long  syne,  for  the  soldiers 
burnt  it  at  the  time  they  shot  this  same  Alexander, 
who  lived  there  then.  It  may  be  true.  I  ken  there 
was  folk  of  your  name  hereaway  when  this  road  was 
but  a  wee  bit  path  through  the  heather." 

And  so  saying  she  hobbled  slowly  down  the  far  side 
of  the  hill.  As  for  me,  I  sat  by  the  old  stones  until 
the  evening  shadows  fell  across  the  hill-tops  and  the 
valley  was  hid  in  mist. 


'  TIPIRERE ' 

IN  the  green  lanes  of  France  you  may  meet  at  any 
time  with  men  of  different  colours.     There  are 
black  men  marching  there,  brown  men,  and  bronze, 
beside  all  the  English  and  French  soldiery.     A  while 
ago  a  long  column  swung  along  the  road  to  the  tune 
of  a  melody  sung  in  time  to  the  marching  feet.     The 
tune  you  would  know,  but  the  words  would  be  new 
-to  you,  or  at  least  seem  so. 

He  roa  te  wa  ki  Tipirere, 

He  tino  mamao, 
He  roa  te  wa  ki  Tipireret 

Ki  taku  kotiro, 
E  noho  pikatiri, 

Hei  kona  rehita  koea, 
He  mamao  rawa  Tipirere 

Ka  tae  ahua. 

It  is  an  old  friend  in  new  guise,  and  the  last  word  of 
the  first  line  will  tell  you  that  it  is  none  other  than 
"  Tipperary."  But  what  is  the  tongue  that  it  is 
sung  in  and  what  of  the  men  that  sing  it  ? 

On  the  under  side  of  the  world  there  is  a  land 
where  the  trees  never  turn  yellow.  Where  the 
summer  is  a  fair  division  of  the  year  with  a  month 

139 


140        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

and  a  half  thrown  in  for  good  measure.  It  is  a  land 
of  big  spaces,  full,  broad  rivers,  and  turquoise  lakes. 
In  the  south  there  are  great  mountains  with  their 
peaks  clothed  in  perpetual  snow  and  their  glaciers 
moving  towards  the  sun-bathed  plains.  In  the 
interior  there  lived  a  race  of  chivalrous  warriors 
who  fought  a  great  fight  against  British  troops. 
Now  New  Zealand  is  as  British  as  Sussex,  and  the 
spirit  of  the  dark-skinned  fighters  who  took  up 
arms  against  the  redcoats  has  come  to  France  in  the 
Maori  contingent. 

When  Britain  first  declared  war  there  was  an 
immediate  response  from  the  Dominions  and  the 
Maoris  asked  that  they  should  be  allowed  to  fight 
for  their  King  with  their  "  pakeha  "  (whitemen) 
brothers.  At  first  there  were  obvious  difficulties, 
ancj  it  was  not  for  some  time  that  the  Government 
was  able  to  accede  to  their  request.  Then  there 
came  a  time  when  there  was  great  rejoicing  in  the 
Maori  pas,  and  the  young  men  flocked  to  the  recruit- 
ing offices,  as  became  the  sons  of  a  fighting  race.  It 
was  disgrace  to  be  hoeing  the  "  kumara  "  beds  when 
the  manhood  of  England  was  needing  respite  from 
the  battle.  They  would  go  over  the  sea  to  help  the 
King  and  the  Empire,  and  so  they  came,  first  to 
Gallipoli  and  then  to  France. 

They  are  children  in  spirit,  and  their  pleasures 
have  always  been  of  their  own  devising.  They  had 
no  written  language,  but  they  handed  down  by  oral 
tradition  the  most  complex  genealogical  trees  and 
their  own  detailed  and  picturesque  folklore.  There 


'  TIPIRERE  "  141 

is  another  side  to  them  that  has  been  evidenced  as 
the  result  of  the  civilization  that  we  have  taken 
them,  but  that  is  not  the  side  we  are  interested  in. 

When  the  war  came  to  New  Zealand  it  found  one 
Maori  boy  dwelling  beside  the  waters  of  Lake  Taupo. 
He  was  happy  as  he  could  be  and  not  overworked. 
He  had  been  taught  English  by  the  Catholic  priest 
of  Waihi,  and  he  could  read  the  papers  slowly,  but 
sufficiently  well  to  tell  that  here  was  a  great  adven- 
ture offered  him.  He  sat  in  the  "  whare  "  one  night 
reading  from  the  cables  how  the  Germans  had 
thrown  our  Army  back  from  Mons.  He  did  not 
know  where  Mons  was,  but  he  knew  that  men  were 
wanted.  He  asked  if  he  could  go  to  fight,  but  was 
told  that  it  was  not  a  war  for  the  Maori.  Then  at 
last  came  his  chance.  He  took  his  younger  brother 
out  to  the  potato  paddock  and  gave  him  detailed 
instructions  as  to  what  he  was  to  do  if  the  kumaras 
were  by  any  chance  ready  for  digging  before  he  came 
back  from  settling  the  King's  affairs.  He  shook 
hands  solemnly  with  his  grandfather  and  performed 
the  "  hongi,"  rubbing  his  own  flat  nose  on  the 
tat  toed  face  of  the  old  man.  He  shouldered  his 
bundle  and  walked  away  past  the  hot  springs, 
through  the  manuka  scrub  with  its  sweet-smelling 
flowers  until  he  struck  the  coach  road  under  Maun- 
ganamu,  the  little  pocket  edition  of  a  volcano  with 
its  dead  crater  filled  with  foxgloves. 

He  walked  to  Waiouru,  and  then  he  took  a  train. 
In  ten  days  he  was  wearing  a  khaki  jacket  and  a 
helmet,  and  doing  tedious  drill  on  a  hard-trodden 


142         LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

square.  Then,  after  the  allotted  space  of  training 
he  was  embarked  with  his  fellows,  all  of  his  own 
race,  and  the  long  journey  to  Egypt  commenced. 
Arrived  at  Gallipoli  he  got  his  first  taste  of  fighting, 
and  heredity  came  uppermost.  Disregarding  all  that 
an  impressive  sergeant-major  had  drummed  into  his 
head,  he  forgot  that  a  bayonet  was  for  use  at  close 
quarters.  He  was  sent  with  the  other  Maoris  on  a 
little  piece  of  work  that  demanded  much  steadiness 
and  the  utmost  quiet.  They  crept  along  the  dere  to 
attack  the  Turk.  It  was  to  be  a  surprise  attack,  and 
the  rifles  were  not  to  be  fired.  It  was  a  surprise, 
and  Hone  went  into  the  thick  of  the  melee  with  his 
rifle  clubbed  like  the  "  tiaha  "  or  the  "  teko-teko  " 
of  his  forbears.  It  was  hard  work,  but  orders  were 
obeyed,  and  there  were  at  first  no  noises  but  the  sound 
of  hard  breathing,  and  the  thud  of  the  rifle  stocks  and 
the  cries  of  the  wounded.  Their  obj  ect  was  achieved, 
and  that  night,  under  the  frowning  heights  of  Chunuk 
Bair,  they  sat  and  talked  in  their  own  tongue  of  the 
glories  of  that  half-hour. 

Then  they  came  to  France,  and  we  find  them 
swinging  along  between  the  high  poplars  to  the 
tune  of  "  Tipperary  "  sung  sweetly  in  their  soft 
voices  and  with  the  perfect  time  that  all  Polynesian 
races  are  able  to  put  into  their  music.  Hone  came, 
too,  and  here  he  is  at  the  head  of  the  column  with 
two  stripes  on  his  sleeve.  As  he  marches  he  wishes 
wistfully  that  his  old  grandfather  and  little  Hori,  his 
brother,  could  see  him  now  and  could  have  heard  the 
cheers  that  greeted  them  in  the  streets  of  the  first 


"  TIPIRERE  "  143 

French  town  they  passed  through.  Once  more  he 
was  in  the  thick  of  things,  but  this  time  he  did  not 
march  back  to  the  bivouac.  A  stretcher  carried  him 
to  the  waiting  motor  ambulance  and  he  was  hurried 
to  the  hospital,  where  a  surgeon  shook  his  head 
sadly  over  him. 

He  lay  there  for  two  days,  but  his  spirit  was 
already  half  round  the  world  to  the  quiet  lake-side 
where  the  white  sand  is  washed  by  waters  as  blue  as 
the  clear  sky.  He  thought  himself  back  at  Taupo 
sitting  under  the  shade  of  the  manuka  bushes.  The 
steam  from  the  hot  pools  in  the  ti-tree  was  wafted 
across  the  water  and  the  boiling  mud  geysers  chuckled 
and  gurgled  like  goblins  as  he  told  his  brother  and 
the  old  man  of  how  he  had  fought  the  Turk  and  the 
Germans. 

The  nurse  at  the  other  end  of  the  ward  was  sud- 
denly conscious  of  soft  singing,  and  as  she  came  along 
the  passage-way  between  the  beds  she  heard  that 
the  voice  was  Hone's.  She,  too,  knew  the  tune,  but 
the  words  were  strange  to  her.  He  roa  te  waki 
Tipirere,  he  tino  mamao,  he  sang.  And  then  as  the 
little  boiling  pools  chuckled  and  laughed  softly  and 
the  note  of  a  distant  bell-bird  came  across  the  arm 
of  the  lake  from  Waitahanui  he  closed  his  eyes  and 
his  spirit  went  to  the  place  where  all  good  warriors 
go- 


THE  NEW  TREK 

OUR  camp  was  in  the  desert,  "  somewhere  in 
Egypt."  It  was  at  a  most  interesting  spot- 
troops  moving  about ;  aeroplanes  flying  at  great 
speed  overhead;  the  ugly  sausage-shaped  balloon 
swinging  leisurely  in  the  blue  ;  and  ships,  great  and 
small,  passing  to  and  fro  along  the  Canal.  Occa- 
sionally the  distant  cough  of  a  howitzer,  registering, 
awoke  memories  of  Gallipoli.  But  there  was  no 
sound  of  any  answering  gun.  All  that  was  by  day. 
At  night  it  was  still  interesting  but  much  quieter. 
The  chuff  !  chuff  !  chuff  !  of  a  pumping  engine 
sending  water  into  the  tanks  far  out  in  the  desert 
lulled  us  to  sleep.  Save  for  this  chuffing  monotone, 
the  occasional  "  Halt  !  who  goes  there  ?  "  of  a 
sentry,  the  answering  call  of  "  Friend,"  and  the  final 
response  of  "  Pass  friend,  all's  well,"  silence  reigned 
in  our  camp. 

The  northern  constellations  shone  gloriously  in  a 
blackness  that  was  intense,  and  Venus,  with  atten- 
dant Jupiter,  dipping  toward  the  dim  Mokattam 
hills,  blazed  brilliantly.  On  other  nights  the  great 
bright  moon  of  the  dry  Egyptian  skies  challenged 

144 


THE  NEW  TREK  145 

the  radiance  of  the  evening  star,  and  flooded  the 
scene  with  golden  light.  From  far  up  the  Canal 
came  the  steely  glare  of  the  searchlights  throwing 
the  sandy  undulations  into  high  relief  and  turning 
some  solitary  soldier  on  the  bank  into  silhouette. 
Those  were  days  and  nights  to  be  remembered. 

At  times,  from  the  bigger  camp  across  the  Canal, 
came  the  sound  of  music  and  the  roll  of  the  drum, 
indicating  that  some  regiment  was  moving  off. 
Following  the  music  of  the  band  faint  cheering 
could  be  heard,  and  the  stirring  strains  of  the 
National  Anthem.  These  were  the  distant  sounds 
of  farewell  ceremonies,  for  the  Force  now  knew  that 
it  had  done  with  the  desert,  and  was  to  leave  for 
fresh  fields  and  new  adventures,  mayhap  to  strike 
a  blow  for  Mother  England  and  for  France.  As  one 
regiment  moved  out,  another  moved  in, — a  kind  of 
general  post.  Sometimes,  just  as  dawn  was  coming 
up,  rosy-fingered,  over  the  rim  of  the  desert,  we 
could  hear  the  band  playing,  and  presently  a  regi- 
ment would  come  swinging  down  the  dusty  road. 
They  had  started  out  on  the  new  trek — to  France  ! 

From  now  on  there  was  a  continual  marching 
and  counter-marching  of  troops.  The  long  pontoon 
bridge  that  the  Australian  engineers  had  built 
across  the  Canal  at  Lake  Timsah  creaked  and 
swayed  under  the  tramp  of  marching  men  and 
camels  and  horses  and  the  rumbling  of  guns  and 
transport  wagons.  On  the  Ferry,  with  its  hand 
winches  and  rattling  chains,  more  men  and  camels 
and  horses  passed  from  shore  to  shore.  Day  after 


146         LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

day  the  marching  went  on,  the  first  of  the  Aus- 
tralians coming  out,  the  New  Zealanders  coming  in 
to  the  desert  trenches.  Then  the  New  Zealanders— 
splendidly  fit  with  their  hard  training — marched 
out.  Later  still  came  the  Maoris,  with  their  free 
swinging  stride — born  soldiers.  Across  the  Canal 
it  was  a  case  of  welcome  the  coming,  speed  the 
parting  guest. 

Gallipoli,  where  our  fallen  lay  thickly  huddled  in 
the  little  cemeteries,  and  along  the  lines  of  trench 
and  charge,  and  where  the  still-clothed  skeletons 
of  our  unburied  dotted  the  slopes  and  hollows  of 
what  was  No-Man's  Land,  was  behind  us  for  ever, 
and,  though  there  were  many  sad  memories,  there 
were  no  vain  regrets.  The  Turk,  in  war,  had  proved 
himself  a  gentleman,  and  as  he  was  not  the  real 
enemy  we  were  quite  content  to  leave  him  to  others. 
In  fresh  fields  we  might  prove  our  prowess  anew. 
There  was  an  expectant  eagerness  amongst  the 
troops  as  they  set  out,  at  last,  to  grapple  with  the 
real  enemy — on  the  fields  of  France  and  Flanders  ! 

A  long-distance  telephone  message  in  the  night- 
time was  our  warning,  at  short  notice,  to  report  for 
embarkation  at  Alexandria.  Arrived  there  we 
found,  at  one  of  the  many  quays,  a  big,  black- 
painted  Atlantic  liner  already  half-filled  with 
troops.  A  thousand  men  were  waiting,  with  their 
packs  and  rifles,  ready  to  embark.  A  crowd  of 
avaricious  Arabs  fought  for  the  privilege  of  carrying 
our  baggage.  On  board,  the  tired  men  were  lying 
about  the  decks  or  searching  for  their  billets.  Every 


THE  NEW  TREK  147 

second  man  seemed  to  be  sucking  an  orange,  and 
the  decks  were  strewn  with  the  discarded  peelings. 
The  ship's  cranes  were  busy  with  the  heavier  cases 
of  Army  Corps  stationery,  and  the  many  other  things 
that  an  Army  Corps  Head-quarters  needs.  Quietly 
and  methodically  the  embarkation  proceeded — the 
embarkation  of  some  three  thousand  men — and 
towards  evening  a  tug  came  alongside  and  pulled 
the  nose  of  our  ship  round  as  she  headed  for  an 
anchorage.  White,  lateen-sailed  boats  were  grace- 
fully skimming  about  the  harbour,  and  here  and 
there  a  motor-launch  threaded  her  way  through 
the  dance.  All  that  night  we  lay  at  anchor,  wait- 
ing, with  the  steady  slow  pulse  of  the  pumps  beating. 
The  pause  gave  the  three  thousand  men  time  to 
shake  down.  Perhaps  it  also  enabled  us  to  get 
through  a  danger  zone  under  cover  of  the  next 
night. 

In  the  smoking-room  old  "  Anzacs  "  met  and 
talked  of  other  days.  There  were  many  here  who 
had  been  in  the  thick  of  it.  The  men  chatted  in 
groups  and  whistled  and  sang  "  Australia  Will  be 
There."  In  the  evening  the  General  came  on  board. 
After  dinner  the  officers  settled  down  to  books  and 
magazines,  and  a  quartet,  forgetting  war  for  the 
moment,  to  a  quiet  rubber  of  Bridge. 

Next  morning  there  was  more  stir  on  board — the 
sound  of  bugles  blown,  commands  from  non-coms 
and  orders  from  ship's  officers  breaking  in  upon  the 
hum  of  conversation  that  arose  from  thousands  of 
talkative  soldiers.     The  harbour  was  crowded  with 


148        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

shipping.  From  time  immemorial  Alexandria  had 
never  been  so  busy.  Some  one  had  said  that  there 
was  more  shipping  in  the  harbour  during  the  past 
week  or  two  than  in  any  other  harbour  in  the 
world.  While  doubting  this,  one  could  not  but 
stand  amazed  at  the  amount  of  tonnage.  Amongst 
the  stately  steamers  that  crowded  the  port  one 
recognized  old  friends.  ;<  That's  the  old  thing  we 
went  down  to  Gallipoli  in,"  said  a  War  Correspondent 
gazing  seaward  over  the  rail.  She  was  swinging  at 
her  anchor  awaiting  her  turn  to  take  another  load  to 
the  new  sphere  of  action. 

In  the  smoking-room  some  officers  were  writing 
letters  to  wives  or  relatives  or  friends — letters  that 
perhaps  might  never  be  delivered.  Already  the 
deadly  submarine  had  accounted  for  one  of  our  big 
ships.  Luckily  she  had  discharged  her  load,  and 
so  there  was  little  loss  of  life.  Nearly  all  the  crew 
had  come  safely  to  Malta.  She  was  simply  one 
more  vessel  at  the  bottom  of  the  Mediterranean,  and 
some  other  ship  would  take  her  place  to  carry  the 
overseas  Armada  on — to  France  !  On  our  port  bow, 
near  at  hand,  another  trooper  lifted  her  anchor  and 
swung  round,  like  a  graceful  lady  in  a  ballroom,  to 
make  her  exit  through  the  gateway  of  the  inner 
harbour.  She,  too,  was  crowded  with  troops  for 
France.  Many  others  followed. 

From  the  feet  of  the  great  mountains  of  Maoriland 
and  the  sun-baked  plains  of  Australia  to  our  new 
zone  was  a  far  cry,  and  already  we  had  made  history 
on  the  way.  The  stirring  scenes — a  wondrous 


THE  NEW  TREK  149 

succession  of  pictures — passed  now  with  cinemato- 
graphic rapidity  before  the  mind's  eye — the  first 
capture  of  German  territory  by  ever-ready  New 
Zealand  ;  the  taking  of  German  New  Guinea  by 
Australia  ;  the  assembling  of  the  great  Armada 
at  Albany  ;  the  long  trek  across  the  seas  ;  the 
destruction  of  the  Emden  ;  the  hard  training  on 
the  heavy  scorching  sands  of  Egypt ;  the  fight  on 
the  Canal ;  the  assembling  of  the  still  greater 
Armada  at  historic  Lemnos  ;  the  landing  at  Anzac  ; 
the  slaughter  of  the  oncoming  Turkish  horde  in 
May  ;  the  taking  of  Lone  Pine  ;  the  charge  of  the 
Light  Horse  at  the  Nek  ;  the  storming  of  Chunuk 
Bair  by  the  New  Zealanders  in  August ;  the  winter 
blizzards  of  the  ^Egean  ;  the  marvellous  evacuation  ; 
Egypt  and  the  Canal  and  the  desert  again.  That 
was  the  end  of  the  first  film. 

And  now  this  new  venture.  Another  film  is  being 
threaded  on  the  machine.  Will  it  be  as  startlingly 
dramatic  as  the  old  ?  No  one  can  tell,  but  we  who 
have  seen  something  of  the  stress  and  strain  of 
Gallipoli  will  await  it  with  a  calm  confidence  amidst 
the  clash  and  rattle  of  the  roaring  loom  of  war  in  the 
new  country  whither  we  are  bound. 


HOW  THE  ANZACS  CAME  TO 
FRANCE 

BY  the  grace  of  God,  the  might  of  the  British 
and  the  Allied  Fleets  and  the  splendid  energy 
and  courage  of  the  Mercantile  Marine  our  Antipodean 
Army  has  once  again  been  transported  across  the 
seas.  This  is  its  fourth  great  move  by  water.  It 
has  come  from  the  land  of  perpetual  sunshine  to  a 
country  of  grey,  humid  skies — from  the  arid  sands 
of  Egypt  to  the  canals,  the  budding  forests,  and 
the  well-tilled  fields  of  France.  The  gloom  of  a 
late  season  is  brightened  by  occasional  days  of  clear 
sunshine,  and  the  promise  of  a  glorious  spring  is  in 
the  crisp  air.  New  scenes  and  new  interests  await 
us  at  every  turn. 

In  these  days  of  frightfulness  it  is  a  tremendous 
undertaking  to  transport  an  army  across  a  few 
thousand  miles  of  sea  infested  with  enemy  sub- 
marines. Yet  here  we  are,  within  seventy  yards  of 
the  German  first  line,  and  the  German  does  not  yet 
know  it.  English,  Scottish,  Irish,  Welsh,  Canadians, 
Australians,  New  Zealanders,  Newfoundlanders, 
South  Africans,  Indians,  Maoris,  Nuie  Islanders, 

150 


HOW  THE  ANZACS  CAME  TO  FRANCE  151 

Ceylon  Planters,  Straits  Settlements  men — all  these 
and  others  too  are  in  France,  fighting  for  the  freedom 
of  the  world.  The  mere  thought  of  it  stirs  the 
imagination,  the  actual  achievement  makes  the 
pulses  thrill.  As  I  write  thousands  of  Russians, 
amidst  scenes  of  almost  unparalleled  enthusiasm, 
are  landing  at  Marseilles.  Looking  back  on  it  now, 
it  seems  very  wonderful  that  we  should  have  been 
safely  transported  thus  far  from  the  ends  of  our 
far-flung  Empire.  Once  again  the  enemy  has  been 
outwitted,  just  as  he  was  at  the  landing  on  Gallipoli, 
at  the  Suvla  landing,  and  at  the  evacuation.  How 
all  this  has  been  accomplished  cannot  be  told  in 
detail  until  the  war  is  over. 

On  March  30  we  sailed  from  Egypt  in  a  big 
Atlantic  liner  that  carried  an  Anzac  General  and  his 
staff  and  three  thousand  troops.  During  the  voyage 
the  submarine  peril  was  ever  in  our  minds.  We 
lived  with  our  life-belts.  We  took  them  with  us 
even  to  our  meals.  At  night  we  laid  them  handy 
beside  our  beds.  When  alarums  were  sounded  the 
whole  three  thousand  men  and  the  ship's  crew  went 
orderly  and  quietly  to  their  allotted  stations.  I  was 
in  charge  of  a  collapsible  boat  inboard  of  one  that 
was  already  swung  out  on  the  davits.  Our  duty,  if 
our  boat  were  ever  launched — of  which  possibility 
some  legitimate  doubt  occasionally  crossed  our  minds 
— was  to  stand  clear  of  the  ship  until  she  sank  and 
then  pull  in  and  pick  up  as  many  men  as  we  could 
out  of  the  water.  When  the  Southland  was  tor- 
pedoed with  Australian  and  New  Zealand  troops  on 


152        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

board  off  Mudros,  one  such  boat  to  carry  thirty 
actually  saved  fifty-seven,  though  it  was  floating 
bottom  upward.  In  that  perilous  situation,  on  that 
frail  craft,  for  hours  wet  to  the  skin,  these  men  from 
the  Antipodes  faced  death  with  a  wonderful  courage 
and  even  with  gaiety.  They  sang  hymns  and  songs 
and  choruses.  And  they  chaffed  each  other 
unmercifully  on  their  bedraggled  appearance.  When 
the  ship's  crew  deserted  some  twenty  Australians 
and  New  Zealanders  who  were  safely  in  the  boats 
volunteered  to  go  back  into  the  stokehold  of  the 
torpedoed  ship  and  feed  her  furnaces.  With  the 
water  swishing  about  her  holds,  they  did  this,  and 
brought  her  safely  into  port !  Is  not  that  a  stirring 
epic  ? 

But  the  chances  were  that  if  a  torpedo  hit  this  ship 
fair  and  square  our  boat  would  never  be  launched, 
and  that  we  should  all  soon  be  floundering  in  the 
water.  In  that  case  we  should  have  to  trust  to 
Providence  and  the  other  boats .  But  three  thousand 
men  from  a  torpedoed  ship  in  mid-ocean  would  take 
a  lot  of  saving.  The  one  soldier  that  every  one  was 
fully  determined  should  be  saved  was  the  little  man 
with  the  three  rows  of  ribbons  on  his  breast,  pacing 
the  deck,  with  a  cheery  word  for  every  one — whom 
Hamilton,  in  a  historic  dispatch,  had  referred  to  as 
"  The  Soul  of  Anzac."  On  board  that  ship  there 
was  scarcely  a  man  that  would  not  willingly  have 
given  his  own  life  to  save  his. 

We  had  pleasant  days  and  calm  seas  throughout 
our  voyage.  Submarine  guards  were  posted  The 


HOW  THE  ANZACS  CAME  TO  FRANCE  153 

gun  astern  was  ready.  Men  with  loaded  rifles  were 
detailed,  at  the  word  of  command,  to  fire  upon  any 
hostile  periscope  emerging  from  the  depths.  On  the 
bridge  and  on  the  upper  decks  a  sharp  look-out  was 
kept.  One  fine  day,  after  we  had  finished  boat 
stations  and  were  just  sitting  down  to  tea,  the 
alarum  went  again — five  short  blasts  on  the  ship's 
siren. 

"  It  may  be  the  real  thing  this  time,"  said  a 
general  as  we  rose  from  the  table,  fastening  our 
life-belts  as  we  went.  There  was  no  fuss,  no  undue 
hurry.  Each  one  went  quietly  to  his  station  as  is 
the  way  with  the  British  in  time  of  peril.  Arrived 
on  deck  we  found  the  ship,  with  way  suddenly 
checked,  swinging  round  in  a  great  circle.  It  really 
seemed  as  if  we  had  sighted  and  were  trying  to 
dodge  a  submarine.  But  soon  the  word  went  round 
that  a  man  had  jumped  overboard.  He  had  been 
in  prison  for  some  offence.  In  a  moment  of  mental 
derangement  he  thought  to  suddenly  end  it  all. 
Still  wearing  his  life-belt,  he  could  be  seen  floating, 
alive,  in  the  sea.  In  a  few  minutes  he  was  a  mere 
speck  in  the  ocean,  then  quickly  lost  to  sight.  A 
fast  grey  mine-sweeper,  with  long  thin  wireless  masts, 
that  had  been  convoying  us  dashed  up,  the  foam 
rising  from  her  bow,  but  searched  in  vain.  The  big 
liner  was  still  swinging  round  in  a  great  sweep.  About 
half  an  hour  had  elapsed.  Suddenly  the  red-painted 
life-buoys  thrown  overboard  when  the  man  jumped 
were  seen  floating  in  the  sea,  and,  presently,  the  man 
also  floating,  with  head  thrown  back,  and  an  arm 


154        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

tossed  by  the  waves  as  if  he  were  still  alive.  There 
was  a  disposition  to  cheer,  but  it  was  quickly 
checked,  for  many  recognized  that,  by  his  rash  act, 
this  one  man  had  endangered  the  lives  of  three 
thousand.  Perhaps  in  war-time  the  ship  should 
have  gone  straight  on,  leaving  him  to  his  fate,  but 
British  seamen  are  not  built  that  way. 

As  the  man  passed  astern,  those  with  keen  sight 
noted  his  wan  face.  He  made  no  attempt  to  turn 
toward  the  passing  ship.  He  was  already  dead. 
There  was  left  only  the  chance  of  resuscitation.  So, 
with  her  backing  screws  churning  the  sea  to  foam, 
the  ship  came  almost  to  a  dead  stop  and  a  boat  was 
lowered.  By  this  time  the  man  was  again  far  astern 
and  lost  to  sight.  The  boat's  crew  rowed — a  long 
pull — into  the  eye  of  the  setting  sun.  Directed 
from  the  ship,  they  reached  the  floating  body  and 
hauled  it  into  the  boat.  In  suspense  we  watched 
the  boat  rowed  slowly  back  with  two  oars.  As  it 
neared  the  ship  we  noted  a  naked  form  across  a 
thwart  and  two  men  endeavouring  to  restore  a  life 
already  gone  beyond  recall.  In  silence,  the  thou- 
sands of  soldiers  watching  curiously,  the  boat 
with  its  crew  and  the  limp  naked  form  was  hoisted  on 
board,  and  the  ship  proceeded  on  her  way,  zigzagging 
across  a  leaden  sea.  That  night  there  was  a  splash 
in  the  dark  water — there  was  one  out  of  three 
thousand  that  would  never  see  the  battlefields  of 
Northern  France. 

Divine  service  at  sea  is  at  any  time  an  impressive 
ceremonial,  in  time  of  war  it  is  doubly  so,  and  the 


HOW  THE  ANZACS  CAME  TO  FRANCE  155 

hymn  "  For  those  in  peril  on  the  sea  "  has  a  special 
significance,  while  "  Onward,  Christian  soldiers, 
marching  as  to  war,"  sung  by  two  or  three  thousand 
soldiers,  thrills  the  nerves  and  sets  the  pulses  beating 
a  little  faster.  There  is  not  a  woman's  voice  in  all 
that  great  chorus.  Leaning  on  the  railing  above  the 
well  deck,  where  the  men,  all  wearing  their  life-belts, 
are  closely  packed,  are  five  generals,  various  members 
of  the  staff,  and  some  soldiers.  The  young  parson 
stands  beside  the  Commander  of  the  Corps.  He  is  a 
Cambridge  man,  a  native  of  Tasmania,  who  has 
taken  holy  orders.  Enlisting  in  the  ranks  as  a 
common  soldier,  he  has  risen  to  the  grade  of  Lieu- 
tenant. He  is  a  thin-faced  man  of  rather  poor 
physique,  but  with  the  heart  of  a  lion.  Whatever 
may  be  said  as  to  the  polity  of  a  soldier  of  the 
Church  becoming  a  soldier  in  the  Army,  there  is  no 
doubt  whatever  that  the  men  respect  and  look  up  to 
the  fighting  parson.  The  stirring  sermon  that  this 
young  lieutenant  preached  that  Sunday  as  our 
vessel  churned  her  way  towards  the  Western 
battlefields,  with  the  white  houses  of  Pantalaria 
looming  ghost-like  through  the  grey  mists,  made  a 
deep  impression  upon  all  who  heard  it.  The 
fighting  parson  was  en  rapport  with  the  fighting 
Anzacs. 

Next  day  the  troops  assembled  once  more,  crowd- 
ing the  after  deck  and  even  climbing  the  rigging  to 
hear  an  address  from  their  beloved  General.  Speak- 
ing extempore  in  his  quick  clear  way,  he  recapitulated 
briefly  the  deeds  of  the  past  on  Gallipoli,  and  told 


156        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

the  new  troops  that  he  knew  they  would  play  the 
game  just  the  same  as  the  old  hands.  He  told 
stories  with  a  humour  that  made  them  laugh 
heartily,  and  spoke  of  the  splendid  spirit  of  the  men 
in  the  attacks  on  Lone  Pine,  the  Nek,  and  Chunuk 
Bair.  He  spoke  also  of  the  entreaties  of  men  to  be 
allowed  to  serve  in  the  rear-guard  during  the 
evacuation.  In  writing  to  the  Private  Secretary  of 
the  King,  he  had  mentioned  this  latter  fact,  and  the 
Secretary  in  reply  had  said,  "  The  part  of  your  letter 
that  gave  the  King  by  far  the  greatest  pleasure  was 
that  in  which  you  describe  the  men  as  fighting  to 
get  into  the  positions  of  the  greatest  danger  "  ;  and 
he  had  added — "  with  a  spirit  like  that  running 
through  your  force,  you  may  well  be  proud  of  your 
Army  Corps."  Finally  the  General  urged  his  men 
to  keep  three  things  ever  before  their  minds- 
training,  fighting,  and  discipline.  And  he  added, 
the  greatest  of  these  is  discipline.  In  this  connexion 
he  said  he  felt  sure  that  in  the  new  land  to  which 
they  were  going,  there  would  not  be  a  single  soldier 
from  Australia  or  New  Zealand  who  would  not 
rather  cut  off  his  right  hand  than  see  the  women  and 
children  of  the  soldiers  of  France  who  were  at  the 
front,  not  as  safe  in  their  keeping  as  would  be  their 
own  wives  and  daughters  and  sisters  at  home. 

u  Three  cheers  for  the  General,"  cried  some  one  at 
the  conclusion  of  the  address.  There  was  a  ringing 
response,  followed  by  a  buzz  of  conversation. 
"  Thank  you,  boys,"  said  the  General  simply,  and 
then  the  bugle  sounded  the  "  dismiss." 


HOW  THE  ANZACS  CAME  TO  FRANCE  157 

With  such  stirring  incidents,  along  our  devious 
route,  we  steamed  across  these  seas,  and  one  grey 
morning  awoke  to  find  the  rocky  hills  of  Southern 
France  and  the  tower  of  Notre  Dame  de  la  Garde 
looming  through  the  mists  behind  Marseilles.  And 
into  that  city,  with  centuries  of  stirring  history 
behind  it,  and  with  a  glorious  promise  of  spring  in 
the  avenues  of  the  budding  plane  trees,  our  good 
ship  poured  out  her  three  thousand  troops.  Other 
ships  had  come  in  before  us.  Still  others  were 
following  in  our  wake.  The  long-expected  had 
come  at  last — we  had  reached  the  promised  land  ! 


THE   SPIRIT   OF   A   NATION 

"  T T  70ULD  you  like  to  see  a  miracle  ?  "  said  the 
VV  Colonel  as  we  came  to  a  break  in  the 
communication  trench,  and  looked  along  a  disused 
road. 

We  assured  him  that  we  should. 

"  Well,  scatter/'  he  added,  as  we  emerged  from 
the  trench  one  at  a  time,  for  the  Germans  could  see 
this  road,  and  in  these  days  even  miracles  cannot 
be  seen  in  safety  if  you  cross  open  spaces  in  groups. 

In  a  green  field  on  our  right  beside  the  road  was  a 
huge  shell-hole.  It  was  as  if  some  earthy  carbuncle 
had  been  rooted  from  the  soil.  On  the  left,  some 
little  distance  ahead,  were  the  ruins  of  peasant 
homes.  And  near  them,  in  a  shattered  shrine,  was 
a  Christ,  life-sized  and  untouched,  on  a  cross.  The 
tumbled  bricks  lay  in  a  red  heap  at  the  foot  of  the 
cross.  Only  the  areole  behind  the  crucifix  was 
slightly  broken.  The  cross  and  the  figure  had 
escaped  unscratched.  That  was  the  miracle. 

"  The  people  here  go  down  on  their  knees  before 
that,"  said  the  Colonel. 

On  a  used  road,  close  up  behind  the  firing  line, 
was  another  crucifix.  A  young  woman  walking 

158 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  A  NATION          159 

along  the  road  went  up  to  it,  made  a  genuflexion 
and  said  an  "  Ave  Maria."  Continuing  her  journey 
she  saw  a  little  child  playing  by  the  roadside.  She 
took  the  child  back  to  the  shrine,  and  made  her,  too, 
say  an  "  Ave  Maria." 

Change  the  scene  now  to  a  homely  interior  in  one 
of  the  villages  also  not  far  behind  the  firing  line. 
The  husband  is  home  from  the  trenches  on  leave, 
and  is  eating  a  meal.  The  women  are  working  at 
their  ordinary  domestic  duties.  The  bell  for  the 
Angelus  tolls.  The  man  stops  his  eating,  the  women 
their  work.  Each  one  goes  through  the  same  per- 
formance, reverently,  as  did  the  young  woman  and 
the  little  child  at  the  roadside  shrine. 

It  is  this  deeply  religious  spirit,  combined  with 
pride  of  race  and  love  of  country,  a  supreme  con- 
fidence in  their  own  powers,  and  a  great  faith  in 
their  just  cause,  that  is  winning  the  war  in  France 
to-day.  There  are  no  rebels  in  this  land,  no  con- 
scientious objectors,  no  stop-the-war  party.  Every 
one  knows  that  the  war  must  go  on,  and  on,  to  its 
legitimate  end.  And  each  realizes  fully  that  there 
is  only  one  way  out — the  destroying  Hun  must 
himself  be  destroyed.  Those  who  had  lost  faith  in 
the  French  have  had  to  revise  their  estimate.  All 
the  old  gallantry  is  still  there  ;  but  with  it  a  more 
calculating  cleverness  and  ability  than  of  old.  Those 
young  officers  from  the  School  of  St.  Cyr  who  swore 
to  go  into  their  first  battle  with  the  traditional  white 
gloves  and  plumed  kepis  of  their  promotion  cere- 
monial, and  did  so,  fell  quickly  in  consequence  ;  but 


i6o        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

they  typified  the  old  elan.  Without  that  spirit 
France  could  not  win  battles  as  she  is  winning  them 
to-day.  That  brilliant  Frenchman,  M.  Barres,  has 
well  expressed  the  spirit  that,  in  August,  1914,  ran 
freely  through  the  land  when  the  call  to  arms  was 
made  :  "In  all  the  villages  the  bells  rang  out  from 
the  old  church  towers  whose  foundations  lie  among 
the  remains  of  the  dead.  They  suddenly  became  the 
voices  of  the  land  of  France.  They  summoned  the 
men  and  comforted  the  women.  So  great  was  their 
clamour  that  it  seemed  as  though  they  would  break 
the  very  stones  of  the  tombs,  and  their  sound 
awakened  in  every  French  heart  the  noblest  virtues 
that  heart  can  contain." 

Yet  it  is  a  changed  France  that  we  see  to-day. 
You  get  your  first  impression  of  an  altered  France 
on  landing  at  Marseilles.  But  Marseilles  itself  is 
not  changed.  The  docks  and  quays  seem  to  be  as 
busy  as  ever.  There  is  a  vast  amount  of  shipping, 
mostly  British.  In  the  glorious  avenues  of  the  city 
the  plane  trees  are  bursting  into  leaf.  There  are 
no  shattered  monuments  here.  Marseilles  is  too 
far  behind  the  lines.  But  you  note  a  great  change 
in  the  people.  Everywhere  there  are  soldiers,  many 
of  them  wounded,  some  without  a  leg,  some  without 
an  arm. 

Out  of  the  gateway  of  the  fort,  at  the  entrance  of 
the  harbour  that  centuries  ago  held  the  argosies  of 
the  old  conquering  Greeks,  comes  a  stream  of  strange 
troops — a  mixture  of  black,  and  white,  and  brown. 
Some  of  them  are  big  fellows,  much  stronger  than 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  A  NATION          161 

the  Germans  who,  under  fixed  bayonets,  we  saw 
unloading  the  ships  near  by.  Marching  up  the 
Rue  de  la  Republique  comes  a  column  of  the  little 
Senegalese,  black  and  jolly,  sweating  in  the  warm 
sun  under  their  packs  and  heavy  overcoats.  The 
mixture  of  caste  and  colour,  and  the  variety  of 
uniforms — blue,  and  red,  and  grey — remind  you 
that  France,  like  England,  has  her  colonies,  and 
that  whereas  Germany's  overseas  dominions  are  to 
her  a  sealed  book,  there  is  free  intercommunication 
between  the  possessions  of  England  and  France  and 
their  motherlands.  At  one  of  the  crowded  quays 
soldiers  partially  recovered  from  wounds  and  sick- 
ness— a  shipload  of  them — are  going  back  to  recruit 
their  wasted  strength  in  Algiers. 

For  the  first  time  we  see  soldiers  wearing  their 
steel  casques.  It  almost  seems  as  if  we  had  stepped 
back  into  the  spacious  days  of  the  crusades.  Some 
of  the  casques  have  dents  in  them.  In  the  varied 
cosmopolitan  throng  that  moves  and  has  its  being  in 
Marseilles,  one  rubs  shoulders  with  tall,  handsome 
Serbs  in  khaki,  Australians  of  the  "  grand  chapeau  " 
— the  French  at  first  mistook  them  for  the  Corps 
Alpin  of  Italy — British,  Canadians,  New  Zealanders, 
Maoris  ;  French,  Italian,  and  English  naval  officers, 
and  the  advance  guard  of  the  friendly  Russian 
influx  that  a  few  days  later  was  to  thrill  the  city 
with  a  new  enthusiasm.  All  this  variety  and  the 
riot  of  military  colour  struck  strangely  on  our  eyes 
after  the  dull  faded  khaki  of  Gallipoli  and  the 
Egyptian  desert. 


162        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

By  way  of  background  there  was  a  sombre  note 
in  the  dresses  of  the  women.  A  great  many  were 
in  black,  with  veils  of  long  heavy  crape  such  as  the 
Latins  affect  in  times  of  mourning.  But  even  these 
women  were  calm  and  confident.  They  were  brave 
also,  for  they  smiled  through  their  tears.  One  saw 
scarcely  any  young  men.  These  were  in  the  lines  at 
Verdun,  stopping  the  mad  onrush  of  the  Hunnish 
horde,  and  along  the  lines  South  to  Switzerland  and 
North  to  Flanders,  where  were  also  the  British,  the 
Australians,  the  New  Zealanders,  and  the  Belgians, 
and  more  French. 

The  old  woman  in  the  little  shop  where  we  buy 
some  books  has  a  brother  in  the  lines,  and  is  quite 
cheerful  about  the  war.  It  will  end  all  right  for 
France.  The  Germans  cannot  win  !  Yes,  she  has 
seen  many  Australians  passing  through  Marseilles — 
the  men  with  the  "  grand  chapeau."  Where  are  we 

going  ?  We  tell  her  we  are  going  to  .  Ah  ! 

there  is  good  beer  and  good  cider  in  that  place. 

In  the  evening  we  hail  a  fiacre  to  take  us  back  to 
our  transport.  The  cocher  demands  six  francs.  We 
offered  him  five,  but  he  would  not  alter  his  first 
demand.  We  tried  another  man  farther  down  the 
rank.  He  asked  seven.  We  went  back  to  the  first 
driver  and  accepted  the  original  offer.  "  Aha  !  " 
he  said,  "  I'll  wager  you  the  other  man  asked  you 
seven."  At  the  end  of  the  journey  we  told  him  we 
were  not  rich  men,  and  that  it  was  the  second  year  of 
the  war.  But  to  this  his  only  reply  was,  "  It  is  all  a 
matter  of  commerce."  The  war,  he  said,  was  going 


THE  SPIRIT   OF  A  NATION        -  163 

all  right.  He  bade  us  a  cheery  good  night,  and  went 
his  way  chortling,  forgetting  even  to  ask  us  for  a 
pourboire. 

In  The  Rapide  to  Paris.  We  are  in  a  crowded 
train,  travelling  in  the  usual  way  at  the  usual  speed. 
We  climb  the  heights  and  get  passing  glimpses  of  the 
lights  of  Marseilles,  very  much  as  one  looks  on  the 
lights  at  the  head  of  the  Adriatic  while  the  train 
climbs  from  Fiume  on  its  way  to  Buda-Pest.  And 
there  is  no  stint  of  good  food  and  drink.  The  dinner 
is  of  the  best.  You  can  have  your  choice  of  five 
different  brands  of  champagne,  and  a  variety  in  red 
and  white  wines.  And  you  can  finish  with  a  glass  of 
benedictine  or  grand  marnier  and  a  cigar — the  latter, 
for  preference,  of  your  own  providing.  The  French 
officers  travelling  back  to  the  front  are  bright  and 
amusing  and  confident.  Yet  it  was  the  fifty-fourth 
day  of  the  battle  of  Verdun,  and  to  the  outside 
world  the  issue  still  hung  in  doubt.  No,  no,  Verdun 
was  not  finished  yet !  But  the  Germans  would  never 
take  Verdun  !  The  English  might  be  nervous  about 
it — the  French  were  serenely  confident.  One  could 
not  but  admire  the  spirit  of  a  nation  such  as  this  at 
a  time  when  the  greatest  war  in  the  world's  history 
was  being  waged  within  its  own  boundaries. 

Paris  !  A  changed  Paris.  More  women  in  black. 
More  soldiers — though  not  so  many  as  at  Marseilles. 
Elderly  bearded  men,  women,  girls,  and  boys  in  the 
streets.  Where  was  the  gay  boulevardier  of  the  old 
Paris  ?  He  had  become  a  thing  of  the  past.  The 
casual  English  perhaps  had  been  too  prone  to  think 


164        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

that  the  light-hearted  Frenchman  of  the  boule- 
vards was  the  embodiment  of  the  soul  of  France. 
He  was  not.  The  soul  of  France  is  rooted  in  her 
soil.  You  will  find  it  in  the  towns  and  villages,  and 
in  the  fields  behind  the  lines  as  much  as  or  more  than 
you  will  in  the  cities. 

But  the  business  life  of  Paris  seemed  to  go  on 
much  as  it  did  before  the  war.  Such  shops  as  were 
closed  at  the  height  of  the  German  menace  had,  in 
nearly  every  case,  reopened  their  doors.  The 
ordinary  shops  were  doing  business  as  usual,  though 
the  volume  of  trade  might  not  be  as  great.  It  was 
very  much  as  in  London.  Just  as  you  missed  the 
fashionably-dressed  throng  in  Bond  Street,  so  you 
missed  it  in  the  rue  de  la  Paix.  And  jewellery  there 
was  cheaper  than  it  used  to  be.  In  the  Place 
Vendome  the  great  costumiers  that  set  the  fashions 
for  half  a  continent  were  no  longer  adding  up 
extravagant  bills.  No  rich  ladies  from  London  and 
no  American  millionairesses  ride  up  in  their  cars 
nowadays.  The  Place  Vendome  is  almost  as  silent 
as  a  tomb.  Only  at  Rumpelmayer's  did  you  see 
something  of  the  old  smartness  in  dress  ;  but  the 
rooms  held  a  subdued  gaiety,  and  while  there  were 
smart  young  women  the  only  smart  young  men  were 
soldiers  wounded  or  on  leave. 

The  Louvre  was  closed,  its  treasures  hidden 
farther  South,  but  we  were  told  that  already  they 
were  coming  back.  Notre  Dame,  in  the  silent  gloom 
of  which  we  rest  and  meditate  awhile,  still  stands, 
and  the  light  still  shines  through  the  glorious  rose 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  A  NATION          165 

window  as  it  did  of  old.  Indeed,  all  the  monuments 
of  Paris  are  safe.  Thank  God  the  destroying  Huns, 
with  the  cold  machines  that  have  been  made  the 
symbol  of  their  Kultur,  were  foiled  in  their  attempt 
to  add  Paris  to  their  other  acts  of  desecration  and 
destruction.  It  is  some  satisfaction  to  us  to  know 
that  this  was  in  a  measure  made  possible  by  the 
coming  of  the  English.  In  large  measure  also  the 
German  plan  failed  because  of  the  promptitude  and 
the  resource  of  a  French  General  who,  in  thousands 
of  taxi-cabs,  hurriedly  and  unexpectedly  rushed  up 
an  army  that  formed  a  barrier  upon  which  this  wave 
of  modern  Kultur  broke  and  spent  its  force  and  then 
receded.  That  great  General,  greatly  mourned, 
lies  in  an  honoured  tomb.  He  has  not  lived  to  see 
the  final  victory. 

And  now  a  new  spirit  has  fallen  upon  Paris. 
Paris  still  stands  as  it  stood,  but  the  people  have 
changed.  The  gay  life — never  quite  so  gay  as  it 
was  painted,  and  less  vicious  a  great  deal  than  that 
of  Berlin — has  given  place  to  a  sober  seriousness  that, 
while  it  does  not  seem  natural  to  a  Latin  race,  yet 
synchronizes  with  the  times. 

From  Paris  to  and  along  the  front  in  the  next  few 
days  we  rode  many  miles  in  trains  and  motor-cars 
through  the  fertile  fields  of  France.  Everywhere  one 
saw  soldiers — here  a  regiment  of  young  Frenchmen 
in  bluish-grey  singing  as  they  marched  along  the 
straight,  unending  Roman  roads  ;  there  Canadian 
cavalry,  strong,  hardy,  and  resolute,  riding  easily  in 
a  fold  in  the  hills  ;  and  yonder  the  tall,  big  meat-fed 


166        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

men  from  the  outer  lands  already  going  into  the 
trenches. 

But  in  the  midst  of  all  this  preparation  and 
atmosphere  of  war,  the  most  astonishing  thing  was 
the  intense  cultivation  of  the  land.  The  old  men 
and  the  women  and  children,  with  a  determination 
and  an  industry  of  which  few  other  nations  are 
capable,  had  left  scarce  a  square  yard  that  could  be 
spared  from  the  grass  lands  untilled.  Streams  ran 
swollen  through  the  gently-sloping  valleys  in  which 
the  meadows  were  emerald.  Cowslips  and  violets 
decked  the  floor  of  the  woods  where  elms  were 
budding,  and  the  tender  green  of  the  larch  and  the 
chestnut  relieved  the  copper-brown  of  the  beech. 
Peach  and  cherry  blossom  were  already  brightening 
the  scene.  The  corn  was  sprouting  quickly  under 
the  soft  influence  of  passing  April  showers.  The 
country,  like  its  people,  was  smiling  through  its  tears. 


BEHIND  THE  LINES 

IN  the  quaint  old-fashioned  towns  and  villages 
behind  the  lines  in  Northern  France  British  and 
Colonial  soldiers  fraternize  with  the  inhabitants 
within  sound  of  the  guns.  The  English  are  learning 
French,  the  French  are  learning  English.  In  the 
towns  the  men  are  free  to  wander  up  and  down  the 
streets,  and  to  add  to  their  daily  ration  little  deli- 
cacies easily  procurable.  No  bread  tickets  are 
needed  in  France.  The  armies  and  the  people  have 
an  abundance.  There  is  no  stint  of  good  food.  For 
amusement  there  are  the  cinemas  and  the  concert 
halls  and  tents.  On  a  Sunday  when  the  birds  were 
singing  in  the  forest  and  the  land  was  bathed  in 
sunshine,  I  wandered  into  one  of  the  cinema  halls 
in  a  town  that  had  just  escaped  the  German  onrush. 
It  had  a  little  stage  with  scenery  painted  by  the 
Tommies  themselves.  Beside  the  operator's  stall 
there  was  even  a  box  for  officers.  True  it  was  not 
regal  in  its  furnishings,  but  it  filled  the  bill.  The 
seats  on  the  sawdusted  floor  were  provision  boxes. 
The  stage  was  occupied  by  an  Anzac  Padre,  one 
who  was  much  under  shot  and  shell  in  the  Gallipoli 

167 


168        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

trenches.  The  hall  was  filled  with  officers  and 
soldiers  gravely  listening  to  his  sermon.  Flaring 
posters  of  the  cinema  shows  decked  the  walls — 
"  Harry  Day  presents  '  Kiss  me,  Sergeant/  '  To- 
night's the  Night/  '  and  similar  themes.  The 
Padre  himself  must  have  been  struck  with  the  in- 
congruity of  his  surroundings,  though  they  did  not 
detract  from  the  forcibleness  of  his  sermon.  He 
would  no  doubt  be  the  first  to  recognize  that  the 
Cinema  as  well  as  the  Sermon  has  a  place  behind  the 
lines. 

Behind  the  lines  you  obtain  some  idea  of  the 
extent  to  which  mechanical  transport  is  used  in 
modern  warfare.  Great  motor- lorries  were  drawn 
up  in  long  columns  by  the  roadside  or  rumbled 
past  with  ammunition  and  provisions  and  a  hundred 
and  one  other  things.  Motor-cars,  motor-ambu- 
lances, motor-cycles,  and  the  ordinary  bicycle  also 
moved  to  and  fro  along  the  tree-lined  roads.  When 
you  see  a  motor-lorry  numbered  27,696  you  are 
inclined  to  rub  your  eyes  and  look  again.  But 
there  is  no  doubt  about  it.  In  this  war  petrol 
counts,  and  the  consumption  must  be  enormous.  A 
whole  army  has  been  shifted  on  to  a  threatened 
flank  and  the  situation  saved  by  the  taxi-cabs  of  a 
city.  True  there  are  horse  teams  also  on  these 
roads.  At  Gallipoli  we  had  to  man-handle  our  guns 
and  even  our  shells,  but  here  you  find  the  horses 
still  harnessed  to  the  field  gun  and  the  howitzer 
of  moderate  calibre,  though  one  day  quite  recently 
I  saw  some  huge  things  swathed  in  tarpaulins 


BEHIND  THE  LINES  169 

being  drawn  across  our  front  by  extraordinary 
engines  with  caterpillar  wheels  that  made  one 
conjure  up  visions  of  antediluvian  animals  that 
lived  when  the  denizens  of  this  world  fought  with 
tusks  and  teeth.  Occasionally  you  do  see  an  officer 
or  a  man  astride  a  horse.  But  the  man  in  a  hurry 
takes  a  motor-car.  Your  modern  knight  is  a  knight 
on  wheels — that  is  when  he  is  not  a  knight  with 
wings.  Day  and  night  this  mechanical  transport 
goes  snorting  and  rumbling  by,  the  heavy  laden 
lorries  shaking  the  very  earth,  making  the  windows 
rattle,  and  waking  you  in  your  sleep. 

Nearer  the  firing  line  you  may  seek  for  adventure 
in  the  battered  towns  that  still  lie  within  the  zone  of 
fire.  The  French  cling  tenaciously  to  their  homes 
though  every  week  the  German  gunners  take  their 
toll  of  civilian  lives.  I  know  well  one  such  town 
wherein  you  may  still  buy  tobacco  or  get  shaved, 
but  always  with  the  possibility  that  it  will  be  the 
last  tobacco  you  will  buy  or  the  last  shave  you  will 
pay  for.  I  went  with  a  staff  officer  through  the 
town  for  a  little  distance  in  a  car.  At  the  end  of 
a  street  on  which  the  grass  was  growing  we  left  the 
car,  and  commenced  a  hot  and  tiresome  walk. 
The  street  up  which  we  went  had  been  shelled  and 
shelled  again.  The  guns  were  firing  as  we  went. 
Save  for  an  officer  and  a  few  men  not  a  solitary  soul 
walked  that  street.  A  glance  into  the  shops  and 
the  houses  revealed  only  deplorable  ruin.  Some 
of  the  scenes  were  pathetic.  In  one  house  a  per- 
ambulator half  buried  in  the  huddle  of  bricks  and 


170        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

mortar,  and  a  cup  half  full  of  tea  on  a  table  indicated 
a  precipitate  flight  from  the  German  shells.  One 
wondered  what  had  happened  to  the  baby.  Was  it 
still  alive,  or  was  it  alive  and  an  orphan  ?  Almost 
every  house  and  every  shop  in  that  street  had  been 
hit.  There  were  some  buildings  that  were  in 
absolute  ruin.  Others  were  holed,  but  still  habit- 
able. Tiled  roofs  were  torn  and  rent  as  if  they  had 
been  made  of  paper.  Gaps  of  varied  dimensions 
were  there  to  let  in  the  rain  or  the  sunshine.  The 
dust  left  from  falling  brick  and  mortar  lay  thick 
on  table,  chair,  and  bedstead,  undisturbed  since 
the  day  the  people  had  fled.  A  rat  ran  through 
the  ruin,  prowling  for  provender. 

Away  behind  the  lines  on  the  borders  of  a  ravished 
land  the  little  mounds  are  beginning  to  be  heaped 
over  our  dead.  But  that  was  only  what  our  men 
expected.  They  have  taken  the  chances,  knowing 
full  well  what  they  were  to  fight  for,  and  already 
some  of  them  have  given  their  all.  They  are  sleep- 
ing their  last  sleep  in  alien  but  friendly  soil.  From 
some  touching  verses  in  The  Anzac  Book  one 
stanza  befitting  the  occasion  may  be  appropriately 
quoted — 

Yet  where  the  brave  man  lies  who  fell  in  fight 
For  his  dear  country,  there  his  country  is. 

And  we  will  mourn  them  proudly  as  of  right — 
For  meaner  deaths  be  weeping  and  loud  cries  : 
They  died  pro  patria. 

It  is  often  stated  that  all  the  romance  and  pic- 
turesqueness  has  gone  out  of  war,  but  that  is  an 


BEHIND  THE  LINES  171 

inaccurate  estimate.  The  warrior  of  to-day  it  is 
true  does  not  ride  off  with  his  lady- fair  at  his  saddle- 
bow, and  he  is  much  more  likely  to  use  the  cur- 
tailed modern  equivalent  of  "By  our  Lady  "  than 
the  original  phrase.  He  recognizes  that  poison 
gas,  tear  shells,  flame  liquid,  and  high  explosive 
are  more  deadly  and  more  prosaic  than  the  harque- 
buse  and  the  javelin.  He  may  even  be  a  little 
disappointed  not  to  find  the  splendid  wine  and  the 
foaming  tankard  of  the  romantic  novelist.  The 
old  lady  in  the  bookshop  at  Marseilles  who  told  us 
that  there  was  good  beer  and  good  cider  here  was 
at  least  not  an  expert  !  The  beer  of  the  country 
doesn't  foam.  It  is  a  weak,  brown,  wishy-washy 
liquid  that  even  Jacques,  our  landlady's  boy  aged 
ten,  has  with  his  breakfast,  and  as  for  the  wine — 
well,  there  is  wine  and  wine ;  but  the  average 
Colonial  soldier  has  not  the  cultivated  palate. 

But  for  all  this,  many  of  our  men  realize  that 
they  are  in  a  land  of  history  and  romance.  There 
are  still  maids  that  are  fair — the  Frank  and  the 
Flemish — and  the  bar  of  an  alien  language  was  ever 
one  that  could  be  readily  overcome  in  the  fields  of 
romance.  Already  attachments  are  being  formed, 
and  it  will  be  strange  if,  when  the  war  is  over, 
some  of  our  antipodean  soldiers  do  not  settle  down 
in  this  fair  land,  or  take  with  them  to  the  sunnier 
climes  of  Australia  and  New  Zealand  some  of  the 
fair  maids  of  France. 


GROUPS   IN   CAMP 

IF  the  shades  of  Clive  or  Wolfe  wander  across 
Salisbury  Plain  in  this  pleasant  spring  weather 
they  must  be  surprised  when  they  watch  our  latest 
soldiers  in  the  making.  They  would  be  mystified 
if  they  were  told  that  finished  soldiers  were  turned 
out  from  the  raw  material  in  a  few  weeks. 

But  it  is  different  material  from  that  which 
went  to  stiffen  the  ranks  on  the  Plains  of  Abraham. 
One  realizes  that  there  has  been  a  change  when  a 
newly-promoted  bombardier  approaches  his  subal- 
tern and,  saluting,  asks  if  he  might  be  allowed  to 
bring  his  car  into  camp.  Near  a  large  training 
centre  in  the  Southern  Command  there  is  an  ex- 
cellent golf  course  and  every  evening  one  may  see 
two  limber  gunners,  a  driver,  and  a  battery  tele- 
phonist playing  a  friendly  foursome.  At  least  one 
of  the  four  men  has  played  against  Braid  and  Hilton. 
Coming  back  to  camp  the  foursome  is  joined  by  two 
other  men  in  gunner's  uniform,  and  the  talk  turns 
to  the  preservation  of  game.  The  No.  i  of  Number 
Three  gun  tells  the  No.  3  of  Number  One  gun  just 
where  and  when  he  liberated  his  last  lot  of  salmon 
fry  in  his  own  stretch  of  fishing  in  the  North. 

172 


GROUPS  IN  CAMP  173 

These  are  some  of  the  men  who,  after  wearing  the 
Red  Crown  and  khaki  armlet  of  the  attested,  are 
now  face  to  face  with  the  reality.  These  men  have 
for  the  most  part  proved  themselves  ideal  material, 
and  even  the  hardened  sergeant-major,  from  whom 
praise  conies  grudgingly,  has  to  admit  that  he  has 
never  seen  their  like  for  conscientious  work  and 
general  cleanliness.  The  slovenly  soldier  is  in- 
variably found  out  at  kit  inspection,  and  so  is  the 
good  one.  The  new  men  seem  to  have  started  their 
life  in  the  Army  with  the  avowed  intention  of 
showing  the  old  hands  the  real  worth  of  new 
willing  material.  They  are  wearing  down  the  pre- 
judices of  years,  and  one  glance  inside  a  hut  occupied 
by  them  is  sufficient  to  show  why.  When  you  see 
men  arranging  their  kit  for  inspection  and  alining 
every  article  in  each  kit  with  a  length  of  cord  so 
that  all  the  mess- tins,  all  the  housewives  and  hold- 
alls are  dressed  like  a  row  of  railway  sleepers,  then 
you  know  that  these  men  are  out  to  prove  their 
worth.  When  the  same  men  buy  themselves  boot- 
scrapers  and  coir  mats  that  their  huts  may  be  kept 
the  cleaner,  when  they  plant  flowers  by  their  doors, 
then  how  can  you  fail  to  look  and  admire  ? 

Queer  things  happen  on  these  parades.  An  in- 
structor, armed  with  all  the  knowledge  of  Shoebury 
and  Woolwich,  asks  after  a  lecture  if  there  are  any 
questions.  The  queries  he  gets  set  him  searching 
the  back  corners  of  his  brain  for  the  very  empirical 
formulae  of  the  gunner.  He  temporizes,  and  per- 
haps says  that  he  will  deal  with  that  matter  in  his 


174        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

next  lecture.  It  is  disconcerting  when  one  is  ad- 
dressing a  class  of  gunners,  all  recruits,  to  be  sud- 
denly asked  if  it  would  not  be  easier  to  work  out  the 
battery  angle  by  using  a  subversed  sine  ! 

The  questioner  may  have  been  a  qualified  sur- 
veyor or  an  honours  man  in  mathematics. 

When  he  joins  the  Array  a  man  may  find  himself 
in  a  strange  backwater.  A  railway  mechanic  may 
be  put  on  to  drive  a  limbered  wagon,  or  a  polo  groom 
may  find  himself  in  the  artificers'  shop.  This  hap- 
pens too  often,  despite  the  multitude  of  papers 
which  every  newly  joined  recruit  has  to  fill  in  and 
the  most  personal  and  sometimes  irrelevant  in- 
quiries which  he  has  to  answer  as  to  his  qualifica- 
tions. He  may  look  forward  to  being  put  into  some 
congenial  and  suitable  position ;  but  he  is  often 
disappointed  and  becomes  a  round  peg  in  the  square 
hole.  The  cookery  may  be  controlled  by  an  ex- 
plumber,  while  a  former  restaurant  cook  may  be 
orderly-room  clerk.  An  optician,  who  was  ob- 
viously cut  out  for  a  range-finder,  may  be  helping 
the  battery  farrier,  while  a  pastry-cook  may  be 
sending  down  strange  ranges  to  the  guns. 

In  the  old  Army  such  things  were  not  so  notice- 
able. There  was  almost  an  eternity  for  training ; 
and  if  a  man  started  in  the  wrong  groove  he  settled 
down  in  the  fullness  of  time.  In  the  new  Army  all 
classes,  trades,  and  professions  are  embodied. 
Often  a  man  may  be  doing  a  private's  work  when 
he  should  have  command  and  responsibility.  In 
some  cases  it  is  obvious  that  the  man  should  not 


GROUPS  IN  CAMP  175 

be  allowed  to  stay  in  the  ranks.  There  is  a  mining 
engineer  who  served  in  the  ranks  as  a  private,  but 
after  ten  months  his  worth  was  realized  and  he  was 
promoted.  He  is  now  a  captain  and  wears  the 
Military  Cross.  His  chief  occupation  now  is  think- 
ing out  delightful  surprises  for  the  Boche.  He  is  a 
master  of  all  explosive  unpleasantnesses,  and  the 
strip  of  country  in  front  of  his  trench  is  in  a  state 
of  constant  eruption.  There  are  many  such  men 
in  the  new  Army,  and  they  are  worth  watching  for 
and  culling  from  the  herd. 

Late  arrivals  though  they  were,  these  men  are 
no  conscripts.  They  take  well  to  the  routine  and 
discipline.  Among  them  are  many  men  accustomed 
to  command,  and  such  men  almost  invariably  submit 
to  discipline  with  good  grace,  for  they  know  the 
reason  and  the  need  for  it.  They  are  the  leaven 
of  the  lump. 


A  CHEERFUL  ARMY 

WELL,  this  is  better  than  Gallipoli,"  said 
the  General,  smiling. 

"  My  blooming  oath  !  "  replied  the  Australian 
soldier,  and  there  was  a  world  of  meaning  in  his 
curt  phrase. 

"  How's  your  health  here  ?  "  ventured  the 
General,  still  smiling. 

"  Pretty  crook,"  came  the  quick  response.  It 
had  occurred  to  him  that  in  his  first  reply  he  might 
have  admitted  too  much. 

Both  answers  were  typical  of  the  character  of  the 
Colonial  soldier.  But  to  one  who  does  not  know 
"  Tommy  Cornstalk "  this  apparent  casualness 
might  seem  to  indicate  familiarity,  if  not  disrespect. 
Yet  nothing  was  farther  from  the  Anzac  soldier's 
mind.  Just  as  the  English  "  Tommy  "  used  to 
refer  affectionately  to  Lord  Roberts  as  "  Bobs," 
so  the  Colonial  soldier  has  his  own  particular  nick- 
names for  the  Generals  and  the  officers  he  knows. 

When  Lord  Kitchener,  General  Maxwell, 
General  Bird  wood  and  General  Godley  climbed 
the  heights  of  Anzac  to  view  the  Turkish  lines,  one 
of  the  Anzacs  asked  who  they  were  ? 

176 


A  CHEERFUL  ARMY  177 

"  Oh,  that's  Billy  Birdwood  and  three  other 
blokes,"  said  his  mate. 

A  little  later,  when  Lord  Kitchener  addressed 
the  troops,  this  apparently  indifferent  soldier  would 
be  one  of  the  first  to  join  the  cheering  throng. 
Similarly,  when  the  Prince  of  Wales  was  in  Egypt 
he  was  heartily  acclaimed'  by  the  Australians  and 
the  New  Zealanders,  though  one  of  the  most  en- 
thusiastic was  afterwards  heard  to  say:  "I  don't 
take  much  stock  in  Royalty,  but  I  simply  had  to 
cheer  like  blazes  !  " 

The  Cockney  soldier  has  a  humour  of  his  own ; 
the  Irishman  has  a  ready  wit  that  never  fails ;  and 
there  is  the  delightful  humour  of  the  Scots  soldier 
with  which  Ian  Hay  has  made  us  so  familiar.  The 
crisp  dry  humour  of  the  Canadian  was  a  novelty 
in  France ;  and  now  there  has  been  added  another 
blend,  for  the  men  from  the  Antipodes  have  brought 
with  them  a  humour  and  a  slang  of  their  own. 
Their  definition  of  the  various  batches  of  volunteers 
that  have  come  out  to  fight  is  worth  quoting.  The 
first  contingent  became  known  as  "  The  Tourists." 
They  were  out  to  see  a  bit  of  the  world.  Inciden- 
tally they  would  do  any  fighting  that  came  along. 
And  they  did  it.  Then  came  "  The  Dinkums  "—the 
true  fighting  men  they  called  themselves — "din- 
kum  "  signifying  the  very  embodiment  of  all  the 
virtues.  There  followed  "  The  Super-Dinkums," 
"  The  War  Babies,"  and  "  The  Hard  Thinkers,"  the 
latter  having  thought  a  great  deal  before  they  came. 
But  even  the  "  Hard  Thinkers  "  are  up  to  the  mark- 

N 


178        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

It  will  tax  the  ingenuity  of  the  Colonial  "  Tommy  " 
to  find  appropriate  names  for  the  batches  yet  to 
come,  but  one  may  be  sure  that  he  will  do  so. 

In  the  meantime  strange  Australasian  terms  are 
being  grafted  on  to  the  language  of  the  French 
and  the  Flemings.  Even  the  "  imshi "  of  the 
Egyptian  Arab  has  been  transplanted  into  the 
vocabulary  of  the  boys  and  girls  of  Northern  France 
per  media  of  the  soldiers  from  overseas. 

Often  the  Colonial  "  Tommy  "  affects  an  air  of 
surprise  or  incredulity  when  his  first  reply  is  not 
exactly  understood. 

"  What  do  you  belong  to,  my  man  ?  "  asked  a 
famous  General  who  was  visiting  Anzac. 

"  Me?  "  replied  the  "Tommy."  "Oh,  I  belong 
to  the  famous  Third." 

"  Why  famous  ?  "  inquired  the  General. 

"  Why  fa Why  famous  !  "  exclaimed  the 

"Tommy."  "Why!  We're  the  blokes  wot  took 
these  blooming  hills  !  " 

And  now  the  Colonial  is  beginning  to  adapt 
another  language  to  the  new  environment  in  which 
he  finds  himself,  but  his  incursion  into  the  strange 
vocabulary  sometimes  leads  to  rather  amusing 
consequences. 

Recently  an  officer  asked  one  of  his  men  if  he  was 
guilty  of  a  certain  dereliction  of  duty. 

"  Oui,  oui,"  replied  the  delinquent. 

"  Very  well,  seven  days  C.B.  Vous  comprenez?  " 
said  the  officer. 

In  Egypt  and  on  the  way  to  France,  the  necessity 


A  CHEERFUL  ARMY  179 

for  good  discipline  was  instilled  into  our  troops, 
and  their  behaviour  has  been  satisfactory.  It  has 
been  the  custom  in  the  past  to  tell  amusing  stories 
about  the  discipline  of  our  troops  and  that  of  the 
Canadians.  The  question  of  saluting  was  often  the 
theme.  "  I  saw  an  extraordinary  thing  to-day," 
an  English  officer  said  one  evening  in  the  mess. 
"  What  was  that  ?  "  asked  a  brother  officer. 
;<  Well/'  replied  he,  "I  saw  a  Colonial  soldier 
saluting  his  Colonel !  "  That  story,  however,  can 
no  longer  be  told  with  any  semblance  of  accuracy. 
Both  Australian  and  New  Zealand  soldiers  now 
salute  as  if  to  the  manner  born. 

Last  winter  when  the  snow  came  in  Flanders, 
and  khaki  was  found  to  be  all  too  conspicuous  a 
dress  in  No-man's-land,  an  ingenious  officer  hit 
upon  the  idea  of  clothing  his  patrols  in  white  night- 
shirts. The  difficulty  was  to  secure  an  adequate 
supply,  for,  even  in  slow-moving  Flanders,  the  night- 
shirt is  now  almost  a  thing  of  the  past.  And  before 
they  could  be  made  to  order  the  snow  might  have 
disappeared.  The  gallant  young  officer  who  was 
intrusted  with  the  commission  resolved  not  to  be 
baffled  by  a  mere  technicality,  so  he  invaded  the 
ladies'  department  of  one  of  the  largest  shops  in 
the  nearest  town  and  gave  the  puzzled  and  blushing 
maid  behind  the  counter  a  wholesale  order  for  all 
the  robes  de  nuit  she  had  in  stock.  Clad  in  these 
garments,  his  night  patrols  went  out  across  the 
snows  unobserved  by  the  wily  Boche  ;  but  that 
particular  battalion  laid  itself  open  to  the  charge 


180         LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

that  it  was  putting  on  frills.  However,  it  didn't 
mind,  as  it  was  putting  them  on  in  a  good 
cause. 

A  week  or  two  later,  when  a  new  battalion  "  took 
over  "  and  all  the  snow  had  gone,  the  incoming  O.C. 
received  a  message  from  Headquarters  asking  how 
many  white  night-shirts  he  required  for  his  night 
patrols  ?  Regarding  the  matter  as  a  joke,  and 
determining  to  get  even,  he  wired  back :  "  Do 
not  require  any  white  night-shirts  for  patrols,  but 
would  like  some  pink  pyjamas  for  my  listening 
posts." 

The  humorists  began  very  early  in  the  campaign, 
and  the  Anzac  censors  certainly  got  a  great  deal 
of  amusement  out  of  their  work.  Men  often  took 
the  opportunity  afforded  of  having  a  dig  at  their 
own  officers,  knowing  that  they  had  to  censor  their 
letters.  In  nearly  every  instance  the  officers  were 
sportsmen  enough  to  let  the  criticisms  pass.  There 
was  a  touch  of  delicious  humour  in  the  epistle  of 
one  "  Tommy  "  who  wrote :  "  Dear  Bill,  I  enclose 
ten  bob  for  tobacco.  Please  let  me  know  if  you  get 
this,  as  it  has  to  pass  the  Censor." 

The  Anzac  Book,  which  is  one  of  the  literary 
treasures  of  the  war,  contains  many  examples  of  the 
humour  of  the  Australian  and  New  Zealand  troops. 
But  the  Anzacs,  ready  though  they  be,  have  no 
monopoly  of  this  saving  grace.  The  Dardanelles 
Driveller  which  ran  to  one  number  and  then 
ceased  publication,  had  one  or  two  efforts  that 
were  gems  of  their  kind.  For  instance — 


A  CHEERFUL  ARMY  181 

BIRTH. 

On  May  10,  at  Gladstone  Villa,  the  wife  of  John  Jones  of 
twin  sons. 

DEATH. 
On  May  10,  at  Gladstone  Villa,  John  Jones. 

Then  there  was  that  effort  entitled — 

Y  BEACH. 

"  Y  Beach,"  the  Scottish  Borderer  cried, 
While  panting  up  the  steep  hillside, 

"Y  Beach." 

"  To  call  this  thing  a  beach  is  stiff : 
It's  nothing  but  a  blighty  cliff — 

Why  Beach  ?  " 

Much  of  the  humour  of  the  trenches  loses  force, 
and  something  of  its  character,  through  having  to 
be  translated  into  drawing-room  English.  One 
Anzacian  who  had  spent  a  busy  morning  with  his 
shirt  was  heard  soliloquizing  at  the  mouth  of  his 
dug-out :  "  Lord  lumme  !  I'm  blest  if  the  little 
blighters  haven't  got  patrols  out  on  me  bloomin' 
tunic  !  "  Nothing  could  be  more  disappointing 
than  such  a  disaster,  involving,  as  it  did,  further 
industry  of  the  most  patient  kind,  yet  the  "  Tommy  " 
got  his  joke  out  of  it. 

When  the  New  Zealanders  had  been  ashore  about 
two  hours  at  Anzac,  a  party  of  them  was  proceeding 
down  the  then  tortuous  path  from  Walker's  Ridge. 
From  an  opposite  slope  a  sergeant  posted  there  for 
that  purpose  called  out  a  warning.  "  That  path 
is  mined, ' '  he  yelled  down  at  the  men  below.  ' '  Then 
catch  us  as  we  come  up  again,"  answered  an  ir- 
repressible humorist  in  the  front  of  the  party. 


182        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

On  the  same  path  later  in  the  day  a  wounded 
Tasmanian  was  dragging  himself  painfully  down 
the  slope  in  a  sitting  position.  He  had  been  shot 
in  the  groin,  and  as  he  bumped  over  the  rough  ground 
an  officer  going  up  towards  Walker's  tried  to  comfort 
him  a  little.  "  Pretty  hard  work,  sergeant,"  he 
said  cheerily.  The  answer  he  got  surprised  him. 
"  Damn  hard  on  my  pants,"  he  said  gloomily. 


BATTLE  SOUNDS 

IT  takes  some  time  to  get  used  to  new  noises  in 
war.  At  Anzac  we  knew  almost  every  gun 
by  name,  and  could  sleep  through  a  duet  by  "  Beachy 
Bill  "  and  "  Startling  Annie/'  to  say  nothing  of  the 
melody  of  our  own  howitzers  and  field  guns.  At 
times,  when  we  were  very  tired,  even  the  resounding 
bang  from  the  Destroyer  on  our  flank  failed  to  wake 
us.  "  Did  you  hear  old  Beachy  pooping  off  this 
morning  ?  "  was  a  frequent  query.  And  as  often 
as  not  the  answer  was  in  the  negative.  We  used 
rather  to  admire  "  Beachy,"  and,  though  he  got 
many  of  our  men,  friendly  messages  were  left 
behind  for  him.  I  have  often  wondered  where  he 
has  pitched  his  new  emplacement.  We  had  also  a 
great  affection  for  the  Destroyers.  There  were  two 
of  them — one  on  each  flank — and  their  memory  will 
live.  Our  particular  Destroyer  was  on  the  left, 
and  the  Lord,  and  perhaps  the  Turk,  knows  how 
much  we  have  to  thank  her  for. 

Here,  in  France,  it  is  all  different,  and  just  as  the 
eye  has  to  get  used  to  new  sights,  so  the  ear  has 
to  get  used  to  new  sounds.  There  are  guns  of  so 

183 


i84        LIGHT  AND  SHADE   IN  WAR 

many  types  and  calibres,  and  a  charming  variety 
in  bombs,  from  the  docile  "  Mills,"  which  you  can 
handle  affectionately  before  presentation  to  the 
enemy,  to  the  big  fat  trench  mortar  fellows  de- 
scribing a  graceful  arc  from  trench  to  trench  ;  from 
the  rifle  grenade  that  goes  away  like  a  rocketing 
pheasant ;  to  the  more  decorous  flight  of  the  ball 
thrown  from  the  big  catapult  that  reminds  you  of  the 
times  and  expedients  of  Julius  Caesar. 

And  there  are  all  the  other  sounds  of  war.  The 
first  night  in  a  town  near  the  firing  line  is  a  novel 
experience.  After  a  tiring  day  in  the  trenches  and 
a  late  dinner  you  go  to  bed  at  peace  with  every  one — 
almost  with  the  enemy.  But  that  frame  of  mind 
does  not  last.  In  the  so-called  silence  of  the  night 
a  continuous  rumble  strikes  in  upon  the  ear.  It 
is  the  noise  that  comes  from  many  wheels  of  motor- 
lorries  and  carts,  and  it  seems  to  continue  unceas- 
ingly. Night  after  night  it  will  go  on  until  the 
war  ends.  It  comes  from  the  transport,  taking  food 
and  ammunition,  and  timber  and  wire,  and  goodness 
only  knows  what  else  besides  up  to  the  front  line. 
Before  the  war  we  thought  that  rather  a  safe  job. 
Yet  here  along  our  extensive  front  there  is  not  a  night 
that  men  are  not  killed  and  wounded  at  that  work. 
It  was  a  stirring  sight  to  see  the  Australians  gallop- 
ing their  teams  along  a  shrapnelled  road  at  night 
in  answer  to  a  message  for  more  ammunition  for 
their  guns.  The  men  on  the  limbers  sat  with  folded 
arms  as  if  on  parade,  with  the  shrapnel  bursting  over- 
head. 


BATTLE  SOUNDS  185 

The  rumble  of  wheels  goes  on  till  far  into  the 
night.  At  intervals  you  recognize  the  old  familiar 
tat-tat-tat-ing  of  machine  guns.  These  are  sweep- 
ing the  parapets,  or  spraying  the  roads  and  saps 
along  which  food  for  man  and  gun  is  being  carried. 
The  wonder  is  that  so  few  are  hit.  At  times  you 
hear  the  measured  tramp  of  a  platoon  or  company — 
a  working  party  or  a  relief — bound  for  the  trenches. 
It  is  a  peculiar  sound  that  tramp  !  tramp  !  tramp  ! 
of  marching  men.  You  can  hear  the  spring  and 
creak  of  the  leather  in  their  boots  as  they  pass. 

The  dial  of  your  illuminated  wrist-watch  tells 
you  how  the  hours  go  past.  Towards  midnight 
you  are  startled  with  a  loud  and  continuous  can- 
nonade. It  begins  with  an  appalling  suddenness, 
and  increases  in  intensity.  It  may  last  for  ten 
minutes  or  for  an  hour,  or  for  several  hours.  If  for 
the  shorter  period  you  know  it  is  a  raid  ;  if  for  the 
longer,  you  surmise  a  more  general  attack.  The 
guns  on  either  side  give  tongue  in  a  loud  dissonance, 
the  concussion  rattling  your  windows  and  making 
the  very  earth  tremble.  You  count  the  discharges 
not  by  so  many  a  minute,  but  by  so  many  a  second. 
The  bigger  shells  go  tearing  through  the  air  with 
a  noise  of  rending  cloth  of  huge  dimension  and 
great  strength.  The  smaller  ones  come  with  an 
insidious  whistle  and  the  crunch  of  high  explosive 
almost  before  the  whistle  has  ended.  These  are 
the  "  whiz-bangs."  There  are  others  that  come 
even  a  bit  quicker.  They  might  be  called  the 
"  bang- whizes."  And  so  the  night  goes  on.  Next 


186        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

morning  at  your  tea  and  toast  in  the  calm  security 
of  your  home  in  England  you  may  read  in  the  com- 
munique that  there  was  "  comparative  quiet  all 
along  the  line/'  And  so  there  was.  What  we 
have  been  listening  to  is  a  mere  madrigal  of  war 
compared  with  the  Wagnerian  noises  that  rend  the 
air  at  Ypres,  at  Verdun,  and  at  the  Somme. 

A  few  years  ago  such  a  cannonade  as  we  have 
frequently  had  on  our  front — shells  coming  three 
and  four  a  second,  and  the  whole  sky  illuminated 
with  their  flashings — would  presage  a  big  battle. 
But  when  after  ten  or  twenty  minutes,  or  an  hour, 
the  fire  dies  down,  we  know  that  it  is  only  a  small 
foray — what  we  call  a  cutting-out  expedition. 
For  a  few  hundred  yards  the  enemy's  trenches  or 
our  own,  as  the  case  may  be,  are  blown  to  bits,  and 
most  of  the  men  in  them  killed  or  wounded  or 
stupefied.  The  men  who  are  to  do  the  raiding  then 
climb  over  their  parapet,  go  with  a  rush  across  the 
hundred  yards  or  so  of  No-man's-land,  jump  into  the 
trenches  of  the  enemy  that  have  been  breached  and 
battered  beyond  recognition,  kill  a  few  men,  secure 
some  prisoners  and  material — papers,  bombs,  flares, 
trench  mortars,  or  even  machine  guns — and  then 
get  back  as  best  they  can  to  their  own  trenches 
through  a  hail  of  the  enemy's  bombs  and  shrapnel. 
They  are  protected  from  serious  attack  by  their 
own  guns,  which  as  they  start  out  suddenly  switch 
off  right  and  left  to  prevent  reserves  coming  along 
the  enemy  trench,  and,  in  the  centre,  "  lift  "  to  form 
a  barrage  behind  that  will  prevent  help  arriving 


BATTLE  SOUNDS  187 

from  that  direction.  On  the  way  back  they  may 
leave  a  few  of  their  own  men  dead  or  wounded 
in  No-man's-land,  but,  generally,  the  honours  are 
with  the  raiding  party.  As  a  rule  more  are  killed 
and  wounded  by  the  shelling.  The  matter  is  all 
thought  out  beforehand  to  the  minutest  detail — 
the  calm  and  deliberate  diabolicalness  of  it  is  simply 
amazing.  But  remember  it  has  all  been  made 
possible  by  the  gentle  apostles  of  culture — the 
peace-loving  nation  that,  to  save  its  own  soul  and 
body,  had  to  wage  a  campaign  of  frightfulness 
against  warlike  Belgium  and  militant  England  ! 
From  one  point  in  our  trenches  we  can  obtain 
an  excellent  view  of  the  enemy's  line  and  at  the 
same  place  look  back  and  see  our  own  front  for  a 
considerable  distance.  Our  patrols  go  out  through 
that  gap  at  night,  right  up  to  the  German  wire. 
They  listen  to  the  Germans  talking.  Recently 
they  have  heard  some  rather  juvenile  voices.  Oc- 
casionally they  meet  an  opposing  patrol,  and  then 
there  is  trouble.  It  is  valorous  work  this  crawling 
through  No-man's-land  like  a  red  Indian  through 
the  prairie  grass,  especially  when  flares  are  sent 
up  and  illumine  the  immediate  surroundings,  but 
there  are  lots  of  men  who  delight  in  it.  Indeed, 
even  for  a  noncombatant  the  temptation  to  make 
one  of  a  patrol  is  hard  to  resist.  A  few  nights  ago  a 
young  New  Zealand  officer  in  charge  of  a  patrol  came 
suddenly  upon  a  German  working  party  out  to  mend 
their  wire.  As  the  New  Zealanders  were  largely 
outnumbered  they  scuttled  back  to  the  safety  of 


i88        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

their  own  trenches.  As  they  gave  the  password  and 
hurriedly  hopped  over  their  own  parapet,  one  man 
making  a  great  noise  as  he  landed  on  a  tin 
periscope,  they  seemed  to  be  intensely  amused. 
At  all  events  the  young  officer  greatly  enjoyed  the 
experience,  and  his  account  of  it,  instead  of  being 
intensely  dramatic,  was  concerned  only  with  the 
humour  of  the  situation.  He  regarded  it  as  a  great 
bit  of  luck  that  he  had  been  able  to  get  out  on  two 
night  patrols  within  a  week.  A  Member  of  Parlia- 
ment who  enlisted  as  a  private  and  is  now  a  junior 
officer  had  also  the  good  luck  to  lead  a  night  patrol 
into  No-man's-land.  For  such  adventure  there  is 
no  lack  of  volunteers.  Recently  when  men  were 
wanted  for  a  raid  on  the  German  trenches  practi- 
cally the  whole  of  an  Australian  battalion,  officers 
and  men,  volunteered,  though  only  twenty  or  thirty 
men  were  wanted. 

It  is  at  the  midnight  hour,  in  an  almost  deserted 
town  close  up  to  the  firing  line,  when  all  the  guns 
are  turned  on,  and  with  the  thunder  of  the  guns 
echoing  among  the  deserted  houses  and  streets, 
that  you  get  your  most  vivid  impression  of  the  sounds 
of  war. 


AN  INTERLUDE  IN  WAR 

IN  the  mythology  of  the  Maori  there  are  chronicled 
many  strange  incidents — the  romantic  happen- 
ings of  love  and  peace  and  war.  Handed  down 
from  the  mists  of  antiquity  by  means  of  the  wonder- 
ful memories  of  the  Tohungas  or  high  priests — for  the 
Maori  had  no  written  language — these  adventures 
of  their  forefathers  yet  live,  and  both  the  actualities 
and  the  myths  of  bygone  generations  have  still  an 
influence  upon  Maori  character.  It  would  require 
no  great  stretch  of  the  Maori  imagination  to  feel 
that  the  spirit  of  Heke,  the  old  warrior  who  defied 
the  British,  and  time  after  time  cut  down  the  pole 
from  which  fluttered  the  English  flag  in  Northern 
New  Zealand,  had  winged  its  way  from  the  legendary 
Hawaiki — whither  the  spirits  of  the  departed  are 
borne — and  was  hovering  over  a  forest  in  Northern 
France  where  worthy  descendants  of  the  tribes 
had  come  to  engage  in  a  friendly  contest  with  men 
from  those  two  great  overseas  dominions — Canada 
and  Australia. 

Heke  was  of  our  time,  yet  he  remembered  the 
day  when  the  Maori  felled  his  tree  by  fire  and 

189 


igo        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

fashioned  his  long  canoe  with  the  implements  of  the 
Stone  Age.  And  now  what  a  change  !  The  Maori, 
whose  fathers  only  a  few  generations  ago  used  the 
stone  adze,  and  whose  ancestors  could  not  be  con- 
quered by  British  soldiers,  is  here  helping  his  former 
foes  in  the  greatest  war  of  all  the  ages,  and,  in  an 
interlude,  meeting  them  and  beating  them  in  the 
forest  at  their  own  game.  As  young  Rawiri  and 
his  men — stripped  to  the  singlet,  their  great  brown 
biceps  showing,  and  pleasant  smiles  revealing  fine 
teeth — stood,  axe  in  hand,  each  beside  his  tree 
awaiting  the  signal  to  begin,  one  could  not  but 
remember  the  heroic  spirit  of  their  noble  ancestors. 

We  left  the  hard  pave  of  a  road  leading  to  the 
front,  and  turned  into  a  shady  lane  going  right 
into  the  heart  of  one  of  those  delightful  forests 
that  add  charm  to  the  flat  lands  of  French  Flanders. 
The  scene  was  one  in  which  the  old  Maori  warriors 
would  have  delighted — the  spaciousness  of  the 
forest,  the  noble  trees,  the  songs  of  the  birds,  the 
perfume  of  wild  flowers,  and,  better  still,  the  scent 
of  battle  in  the  air.  At  intervals  the  boom  of  a 
distant  gun  broke  in  upon  the  singing  of  the  birds, 
the  chiming  of  church  bells,  and  the  purring  of  a 
forest  sawmill. 

We  had  an  Australian  band  that  played  good 
music,  though,  as  some  one  remarked,  its  members 
were  not  bandsmen  but  miners.  There  were  present 
English,  Scottish,  Irish,  and  Welsh.  French  Cana- 
dians talked  to  each  other  in  French,  and  in  the 
middle  of  a  conversation  would  switch  off  into  Eng- 


AN  INTERLUDE  IN  WAR  191 

lish.  A  French  "  bucheron,"  seated  on  a  fallen  tree 
beside  an  English  War  Correspondent,  was  saying 
to  him — no  doubt  with  memories  of  his  own  recent 
defeat  in  these  same  woods :  "  Ah  !  these  Colonials, 
they  are  not  good  axemen  ;  they  waste  too  much 
timber."  A  Canadian  with  a  Yankee  drawl  and 
some  swagger  was  asking  for  "  real  trees."  These 
trees,  he  said,  were  only  saplings  !  That  was  before 
the  contest,  and  he  had  perhaps  never  heard  of  the 
giant  kauri  in  the  forests  of  Northern  New  Zealand. 
Could  he  but  see  those  forests,  he  would  no  doubt 
have  to  admit  that  a  kauri  is  "  some  tree."  Later, 
a  critical  Australian,  watching  this  same  swaggering 
axeman  hacking  not  too  skilfully  at  a  hard  elm, 
was  heard  to  remark  with  caustic  humour  that  he 
could  do  better  with  a  knife  and  fork  ! 

A  very  young  English  officer  beside  me  was  in- 
terested in  the  New  Zealanders.  "  I  hear  there  are 
a  lot  of  awful  blackguards  among  them,"  he  said. 
I  made  a  noncommittal  reply  :  he  had  evidently 
mistaken  me  for  an  Englishman.  He  wondered 
if  the  Maoris  talked  English  !  I  assured  him  that 
they  did,  better  possibly  than  he  or  I,  and  that 
quite  likely  there  were  among  them  several  with 
University  degrees.  He  presumed  they  were  good 
at  games.  I  told  him  they  had  earned  some  fame 
at  "  rugger,"  that  they  played  cricket  fairly  well, 
and  that  a  Maori  had  carried  off  the  New  Zealand 
Golf  Championship.  "  Are  you  with  the  New 
Zealanders  ?  "  he  asked,  looking  me  up  and  down. 
"  Yes,"  I  replied,  "  I  am  a  New  Zealander."  Then 


192        LIGHT  AND  SHADE   IN  WAR 

the  conversation  languished  somewhat,  and  with 
all  due  modesty  I  assumed  that  my  friend  was 
thinking  he  might  have  been  misinformed  about 
my  countrymen.  After  all  he  was  a  very  young 
officer,  and,  no  doubt,  as  brave  as  his  forefathers 
who  ventured  forth  in  the  crusades  or  who  fought 
at  Blenheim  or  Almanza.  And  one  felt  certain 
that  he  would  be  just  as  ready  to  die  in  a  ditch  in 
Flanders,  maintaining,  to  the  last  gasp,  the  honour 
of  the  family  name.  All  the  same  one  could  not 
help  recalling  the  lines  of  our  English  poet-seer — 

What  do  they  know  of  England 
Who  only  England  know  ? 

But  this  war  and  these  meetings  under  alien 
skies  are  doing  us  all  good,  and  are  giving  us  a  better 
understanding  of  each  other,  with  the  inevitable 
result  that  in  Government,  and  commerce,  in  the 
arts  of  peace  and  war,  the  Motherland  and  her  loyal 
Dominions  will  be  drawn  yet  closer  together  for 
mutual  welfare  and  protection. 

Meantime  the  axemen  are  waiting  beside  their 
trees :  a  shrill  whistle  gives  the  signal  to  commence, 
and  immediately  the  chips  begin  to  fly.  Canada 
has  three  teams,  Australia  two,  and  New  Zealand 
one — the  latter  selected  from  the  few  hundred 
Maoris  who  are  with  the  Pioneer  Battalion.  There 
are  three  men  in  a  team,  and  three  trees  have  to  be 
felled  by  each  team.  Any  one  man  in  the  group 
may  help  to  fell  any  of  the  three  trees.  Thus  when 
one  man  has  felled  his  tree  he  rushes  to  the  assistance 
of  one  of  his  comrades,  till  towards  the  finish  there 


AN  INTERLUDE  IN  WAR  193 

are  usually  three  men  hacking  away  at  the  last 
tree.  The  lots  of  three  trees  average  in  circumfer- 
ence 5  metres  50  centimetres,  and  the  wood  is 
hard.  The  Maoris  have  drawn  a  set  of  trees  the 
average  of  which  is  above  all  the  others,  but  the 
difference  is  not  great.  It  is  fair  to  add  that  the 
Maoris,  having  been  at  work  in  the  forest  for  some 
little  time,  are  in  slightly  better  condition  than  the 
other  axemen.  One  of  the  Canadian  teams  chopped 
first,  but  it  was  clear  to  experienced  bushmen  that 
they  would  have  no  chance  against  the  dusky  war- 
riors from  the  Antipodes.  The  Australians  were 
an  unknown  quantity.  Their  first  team  shaped 
well.  They  beat  the  Canadians  easily.  The  crowd 
were  evidently  very  interested  in  the  Maori  axemen. 
Unperturbed  by  the  interest  they  were  exciting,  the 
three  young  men  remained  standing  silently,  axe 
in  hand,  each  beside  his  tree,  and  when  the  whistle 
sounded  they  went  to  work  with  fine  swinging  blows, 
each  stroke  falling  within  the  smallest  fraction  of 
an  inch  of  the  one  before,  just  as  a  perfect  golfer 
might  swing  his  club,  and,  hitting  on  the  exact 
spot,  send  his  ball  flying  well  and  truly  from  the  tee. 
The  "  scarf e  "  left  as  the  gap  in  the  tree  widened 
was  almost  as  if  it  had  been  cut  with  a  saw — with 
such  accuracy  did  the  blows  from  the  keen  swinging 
axes  fall.  The  first  tree  came  crashing  to  the  ground, 
to  an  accompaniment  of  cheers,  in  six  minutes. 
It  was  a  tree  i  metre  45  centimetres  in  circumfer- 
ence. The  second  tree  fell  in  seven  minutes.  At 
the  last  tree — the  biggest  in  any  of  the  groups — the 


194        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

three  Maoris  were  now  all  plying  their  axes  in  style. 
In  9  minutes  40  seconds  it,  too,  had  fallen,  the  three 
trees  thus  having  been  brought  down  in  22  minutes 
40  seconds.  This  was  a  record  that,  evidently,  it 
would  be  difficult  to  excel,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact 
none  of  the  other  teams  approached  it.  The  results 
were — 

Min.  Sec. 

New  Zealand          .          .          .          .     22     40 
Australia       .          .          .          .  31       8 

Canada          .          .          .          .          .     45     22 

Following  this  contest  there  was  a  log-chopping 
test  won  by  an  Australian,  with  a  Maori  second. 
It  was  almost  a  dead  heat.  In  a  cross-cut  sawing 
competition,  a  Canadian  pair  just  managed  to  beat 
a  Maori  team  by  about  a  second.  The  prize  for  the 
best  axemanship  was  won  by  a  Maori. 

Thus  ended  a  competition  that  will  perhaps  be 
memorable  in  the  annals  of  warfare.  A  day  or  two 
before,  in  a  village  only  a  few  miles  away,  an  Aus- 
tralian General  was  wounded  and  an  Australian 
doctor  blown  to  bits  by  a  German  high  explosive 
shell.  Yet  here  we  were,  with  competitors  from 
our  widely-scattered  Dominions,  calmly  carrying 
out  in  the  midst  of  idyllic  surroundings  this  strange 
contest.  Under  the  circumstances  it  was  an  event 
such  as  perhaps  only  the  British  could  have  con- 
ceived. One  of  my  last  impressions  of  it  was  a 
glimpse  of  the  Maoris  grouped  for  a  photograph 
by  the  Baronne  from  a  neighbouring  chateau.  She 
will  have  an  interesting  picture.  Thousands  of 


AN  INTERLUDE  IN  WAR  195 

miles  from  their  ancestral  home,  here  they  were, 
ready  and  willing,  in  forest  or  trench,  to  strike  a 
blow  for  the  honour  of  their  native  land  and  of 
Mother  England.  Yes,  of  a  surety  the  spirit  of 
Heke,  who  time  and  again  cut  down  the  flagpole, 
and  of  old  Rewi,  who  when  asked  to  surrender 
said  he  would  fight  on  for  ever  and  ever,  remains 
with  young  Rawini  and  his  men  as,  smiling,  sweating 
and  victorious,  they  lean  upon  their  axes  beside  the 
fallen  elm — a  pygmy  compared  with  their  own  giant 
kauri — in  a  forest  in  Northern  France.  The  native 
New  Zealander  again  had  proved  his  prowess  in  a 
new  field,  far  from  his  home,  just  as  he  had  done  in 
that  desperate  night  attack  on  Gallipoli  when,  with 
empty  magazine  and  fixed  bayonet,  he  helped  to  clear 
the  foothills  of  the  hostile  Turks,  and  to  pave  the 
way  for  the  memorable  attack  on  Chunuk  Bair. 


FIVE  MEN  FROM  LONDON 


A  CONCERT  PARTY  AT  THE  FRONT 

Five  old  men  from  London  Town, 

Rather  weak  to  break  a  lance, 
Still  can  wander  up  and  down 

Thro'  the  stricken  fields  of  France, 
Still  with  song  and  story  can 
Touch  the  heart-strings  of  the  man 
Who  for  honour's  sake  will  give 
His  red  blood  that  Right  may  live. 

Cheer  them  on  their  forward  way  : 
Right,  not  Might,  shall  win  the  day. 

SEVEN  Anzacs,  including  the  driver  and  the 
jolly  Padre,  who  was  stout  and  occupied 
much  room,  crowded  into  a  20  h. p.  car  and  landed  in 
an  old  Flemish  town  that  was  still  standing,  com- 
paratively uninjured,  near  the  front.  Passing  a 
church  dating  from  the  fourteenth  century,  and 
the  Hotel  de  Ville  with  a  belfry  of  only  a  century 
later,  they  were  on  historic  ground.  On  a  hill  not 
far  away  there  had  been  a  citadel  in  Roman  times. 
There  battles  had  raged  and  sieges  endured.  About 
that  hill  Philip  IV  of  France  had  fought,  and,  after 
him,  Philip  of  Valois,  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  and  the 
Prince  of  Orange. 

196 


FIVE  MEN  FROM  LONDON  197 

In  a  great  tent,  bedecked  with  flags  and  lit  with 
shaded  electric  lights,  we  found  two  thousand  men 
and  officers  assembled — among  them  a  General  and 
a  Scottish  Earl.  A  blue  haze  from  at  least  a  thou« 
sand  cigarettes  and  pipes  was  slowly  rising  to  the 
roof — an  incense  from  all  the  blends  and  brands  of 
all  the  tobaccos  of  the  British  Empire,  Egypt, 
and  America. 

Every  seat  in  the  tent  was  occupied  and  there 
was  a  fringe  of  standing  men  at  the  sides.  A  film 
filled  in  a  few  minutes.  Then  an  elderly,  grey- 
headed man  appeared.  He  was  the  pianist  of  the 
Concert  Company,  and,  briefly  and  amusingly,  he 
gave  us  an  inkling  of  what  was  in  store  for  us. 
There  was  in  addition  a  violinist,  a  tenor,  a  baritone, 
and  a  comic  man.  These  five  formed  what  was 
called  the  "  Lena  Ash  well  Firing  Line  Concert 
Party."  Similar  Concert  Companies,  arranged  by 
Miss  Lena  Ashwell  and  supported  by  generous 
donors,  have  been  touring  behind  the  lines  in  France 
and  Flanders.  This  particular  company  had  actu- 
ally given  a  concert  well  within  the  range  of  the 
German  guns. 

The  violinist  played  well,  the  tenor  sang  delight- 
fully, the  baritone  almost  "  brought  down  the  tent," 
especially  with  a  famous,  rollicking  West  Country 
song  in  dialect.  The  funny  man  was  really  funny, 
and  sang,  and  told  stories,  till  the  tent  was  filled 
with  jolly  laughter.  There  was  no  woman's  voice 
in  that  entertainment.  All  who  listened  were 
warriors  who  had  been  in  or  were  about  to  go  into 


198        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

the  trenches.  Their  strong,  determined  faces  and 
their  big  frames  gave  no  indication  of  any  degeneracy 
in  the  British  race. 

There  were  officers  and  men  from  almost  every 
part  of  our  great  Empire,  and  even  Britons  from 
neutral  countries  still  farther  afield.  The  Y.M.C.A. 
man  who  was  "  running  the  show  "  was  a  Canadian, 
whom  a  few  years  ago  we  had  known  as  an  enthusi- 
astic worker  in  Wellington,  New  Zealand.  He 
told  us  that  only  a  few  days  before  he  was  waiting 
at  a  railway  crossing  when  two  New  Zealand  Artil- 
lerymen dashed  up  and  gave  him  a  hearty  greeting. 
They  were  two  of  his  boys  from  the  Wellington 
Y.M.C.A.  !  London  is  no  longer  the  meeting-place 
of  the  Empire.  Marvellous  to  relate  it  has  been 
shifted  to  Northern  France. 

And,  at  a  time  when  our  men  have  fought  glori- 
ously in  the  North  Sea,  we  of  the  Army  do  not  forget 
that  this  has  been  made  possible  through  the  might 
and  courage  of  the  British  Navy.  Are  we  down- 
hearted ?  No  !  The  glorious  deeds  of  the  Battle 
Cruiser  Squadron  come  across  the  waters  like  a 
trumpet  call  urging  us  to  still  greater  deeds  on  land. 
To  hear  those  two  thousand  men  cheering  British 
song  and  story  close  up  to  the  lines  in  Northern 
France,  and  listen  afterwards  to  their  full-throated 
paean  of  "  God  save  our  gracious  King,"  was 
indeed  inspiring.  Could  the  War  Lord  have  turned 
for  a  moment  from  the  remains  of  his  shattered 
fleet  at  Wilhelmshaven  and  glimpsed  this  scene 


FIVE  MEN  FROM  LONDON  199 

in  the  Y.M.C.A.  tent,  his  proud  boastings  of  "  vic- 
tory" might  at  least  have  been  modified. 

Two  things  struck  one  at  this  concert — the  intense 
silence  in  which  the  men  listened,  and  the  wonderful 
enthusiasm  of  their  applause  at  the  end  of  a  song 
or  a  series  of  stories. 

Many  of  us  had  not  heard  such  a  concert  since 
the  war  began,  and  the  songs  and  tunes  carried 
our  thoughts  across  the  seas  to  our  homes  in  Mother 
England,  and,  in  some  cases,  many  thousands  of 
miles  farther. 

As  the  great  tent  slowly  emptied  after  the  National 
Anthem,  and  we  went  our  several  ways  in  the  long 
summer  twilight  of  Northern  France,  one  and  all 
felt  the  better  for  hearing  the  old  English  songs  and 
the  English  music  once  again. 


THE  RAIDERS 

AN  hour's  ride  in  a  motor-car  brought  us  to  a 
Brigade  Headquarters  soon  after  eleven  at 
night  by  the  summer  clock.  We  found  ourselves 
in  a  spacious  room  in  a  big  house.  Even  a  City 
magnate  might  be  proud  to  have  such  a  room  for 
his  office.  Obviously  this  had  been  the  home  of 
some  rich  man.  One  wondered  what  had  become 
of  him — what  had  become  of  his  family,  and  what 
of  his  wealth.  In  the  iron  grate  a  bright  wood 
fire  was  blazing — such  a  fire  as  the  man  and  his 
wife  and  his  sons  and  daughters  might  have  been 
sitting  about  in  this  rather  chilly  midsummer's 
night.  In  place  of  the  master  of  the  house  one  saw 
a  Brigadier  in  khaki  standing  pensive  in  front  of  the 
fire.  My  thoughts  flew  back  to  a  gloomy  dug-out 
where  last  I  had  seen  him  under  fire  on  Gallipoli 
during  a  rather  critical  stage  of  the  great  evacuation. 
The  transformation  seemed  almost  impossible — un- 
real! 

At  a  table  sat  two  signallers,  one  with  a  telephone 
strapped  to  his  ear.  At  another  table  beside 
another  instrument  sat  an  artillery  officer,  smoking 

200 


THE  RAIDERS  201 

a  pipe.  He  was  in  touch  with  Artillery  Headquar- 
ters and  with  the  batteries.  But  for  his  khaki  and 
his  medal  ribbons  he  might  have  been  a  young 
stockbroker  awaiting  news  of  a  deal  in  Consols. 

The  bombardment  had  already  commenced.  It 
had  broken  in  upon  the  silence  of  the  night  with  an 
awful  suddenness.  Lurid  flashes  lit  up  the  sky. 
The  loud  reports  of  guns,  the  roar  of  shells  tearing 
through  the  air,  the  crunch  of  high  explosive  made 
a  noise  that  would  have  been  terrifying  to  unaccus- 
tomed ears.  It  was  as  the  noise  of  several  thunder- 
storms rolling  in  a  grand  cadence  among  the  moun- 
tains. Yet  there  was  not  a  great  number  of  batteries 
engaged.  One  wondered  what  it  must  be  like  at 
Verdun  !  Almost  at  once  the  din  was  increased 
by  the  booming  of  enemy  guns  and  the  crash  and 
crunch  of  their  high  explosive.  At  intervals,  break- 
ing in  upon  the  resounding  boom  of  the  guns,  came 
the  rat-tat-tat  of  the  machine  guns  beating  their 
devil's  tattoo  that  meant  a  hail  of  lead  on  path  and 
parapet. 

In  the  big  room  there  was  an  air  of  tense  expec- 
tancy. A  man  looked  at  his  watch  and  said, 
''They've  started  now."  A  buzz  on  the  telephone 
and  there  arrived  a  message  announcing  the  fact. 
Then  there  came  another  strained  wait.  Something 
had  gone  wrong  with  the  advanced  signals. 

The  officer  in  the  room  takes  up  the  instrument 
and  asks  why  there  is  no  word.  "  Go  out  yourself 
and  see,"  he  telephones,  at  the  same  time  asking 
the  man  at  the  other  end  to  leave  his  companion  in 


202        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

the  signal  dug-out.  Presently  the  Brigadier  is 
called  to  the  instrument.  Some  men  have  come 
in  and  there  is  news.  We  listen  to  one  end  of 
the  conversation  amidst  the  roar  of  the  guns 
and  the  noise  of  the  shells  sweeping  past.  "  Yes  ! 
Yes  !  "  he  says.  "  You  did  !  "  "  How  many  ?  " 
"  Two  !  "  lt  Quite  right  !  Quite  right !  "  Intui- 
tively we  know  what  has  happened.  A  Major  from 
Battalion  Headquarters  makes  a  significant  gesture 
with  his  hand. 

Another  pause.  Then  more  messages.  The  anx- 
iety now  is  for  our  own  men.  How  many  of  them 
will  get  back.  The  telephone  rings  frequently  now, 
and  much  information — somewhat  scrappy,  it  is  true 
— comes  from  the  firing  line.  "  Thirty- two  men 
in  !  "  "  Forty-eight  men  in  ! — some  are  wounded." 
"  All  in  but  one  !  "  That  one  is  a  young  Lieutenant 
who  though  wounded  early  in  the  advance  continued 
to  lead  his  men.  Another  tense  wait,  and  then 

the  welcome  news,  "  All  in  !  " 

***** 

At  midnight  our  guns  cease  firing  as  quickly  as 
they  commenced.  The  enemy  guns  carry  on  a 
desultory  bombardment,  that  gradually  dies  down. 
At  last  there  is  comparative  silence,  broken  soon 
by  the  haunting  sound  of  the  gas  sirens,  somewhat 
faint  in  the  distance,  more  insistent  in  our  own 
sector,  and  then  growing  fainter  again  as  the  sirens 
farther  down  the  line  take  up  the  alarum.  The 
guns  of  another  division  can  now  be  heard  booming 
in  the  distance.  It  is  probably  that  division  that 


THE  RAIDERS  203 

the  Hun  is  endeavouring  to  gas.  One  after  another 
our  own  battalions  report  "  Gas  attack  uncon- 
firmed "  in  their  area.  But  there  was  gas  that 
night  farther  up  the  line.  Motoring  home  between 
two  and  three  in  the  morning  we  encountered  it 
some  miles  away  from  the  spot  at  which  it  came 
hissing  from  the  German  trenches.  The  acrid  fumes 
of  the  chlorine  caught  us  in  the  throat  and  made  our 
eyes  smart.  In  the  villages  men  had  risen  from  their 
beds  on  hearing  the  alarum.  Our  driver,  a  laconic 
Scot,  rolling  his  R's  delightfully,  remarked,  "  There's 
a  lot  o'  them  oot  in  their  shirt-tails  the  nicht." 
The  cavalry  and  the  drivers  of  the  convoys  had 
donned  their  masks,  and  looked  for  all  the  world 
like  a  column  of  goggle-eyed  divers  on  horseback. 
Next  morning  the  crops  along  the  road  were  blighted 
by  this  inhuman  poison  of  modern  warfare.  There 
may  be  some  things  that  posterity  will  forgive 
the  German  people  for,  but  not,  surely,  for  this 
fiendish  method  of  killing  men. 

At  i  a.m.  the  air  is  once  more  in  travail  with  the 
roar  of  guns.  An  anxious  inquiry  from  the  trenches 
comes  down  to  us,  but  the  Brigade  Major  replies 
cheerily,  "  No,  it's  our  guns.  We're  giving  them  one 
minute  of  the  best."  And  sure  enough  we  were. 
The  gunners,  warmed  to  their  work,  seemed  to  be 
going  for  all  they  were  worth.  The  enemy  planted 
a  few  shells  on  our  subsidiary  lines,  but  generally 
he  seemed  rather  depressed  this  night.  Perhaps  he 
had  sent  some  of  his  guns  away  post  haste  where 
he  thought  they  might  be  more  needed.  The 


204        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

Russian  bear  was  coming  back  to  his  haunts  of  a 

year  ago  !    And  there  might  be  other  happenings. 
***** 

All  this  we  knew  of  in  the  big  room  of  the  rich 
man's  house.  We  also  knew  that  we  ourselves  were 
not  immune  from  enemy  shells.  Only  a  few  days 
before  I  had  seen  blood  running  on  the  pavements 
of  this  same  place,  and  shelling  that  had  killed  and 
wounded  harmless  civilians,  including  children. 
There  was  the  rent  of  shrapnel  in  the  very  room 
in  which  we  sat. 

But  out  there  in  the  trenches  and  in  No-man's- 
land  they  were  in  the  thick  of  it,  and  things  were 
happening.  After  the  first  ten  minutes  of  intensive 
bombardment  and  the  suspense  of  it  all,  the  raiders, 
in  prearranged  formation,  dashed  across  the  inter- 
vening space  where  the  weeds  and  grass  grow  rank 
and  the  earth  is  pocked  and  pitted  as  if  with  a  foul 
disease.  At  that  moment  some  of  our  guns  switched 
off  right  and  left,  and  others  "  lifted  "  to  form  a 
protecting  barrage  against  an  enemy  counter-attack. 
But  before  they  had  gone  twenty  yards  the  leader 
of  the  foray  had  fallen  mortally  wounded.  His 
lieutenant  fell  with  him,  and  they  were  left  lying 
there  while  the  others  dashed  on.  The  signallers, 
failing  to  unwind  their  wire  quickly  enough,  could 
not  keep  up  with  the  others.  The  assaulting  parties 
moved  on  through  a  gap  cut  in  the  German  wire 
by  our  trench  mortars,  and  were  soon  in  the  enemy's 
trench.  One  of  the  officers,  a  lieutenant,  though 
wounded  in  the  chest  and  shoulder,  carried  on  to  the 


THE  RAIDERS  205 

end.  He  remained  in  the  enemy's  trench  until  all 
the  men  were  withdrawn,  and  he  was  the  last  man 
to  reach  our  own  lines. 

Meantime  our  men  had  gone  bombing  the  dug- 
outs up  and  down  the  trench.  They  found  four 
Germans  dead  in  the  trench,  and  bayoneted  two 
moie.  The  others  had  evidently  beaten  a  precipi- 
tate retreat  the  moment  the  shelling  began.  Our 
splendid  artillery  fire  undoubtedly  accounted  for 
many  more.  The  German  trench  was  battered 
beyond  recognition,  and  in  places  it  was  altogether 
swept  away.  Clear  proof  here  of  what  we  can  do 
if  the  British  workman  will  only  give  us  guns  and 
shells.  But  if  he  insists  on  taking  holidays  he 
cannot  give  us  all  we  need.  The  men  at  the  front 
take  no  holidays.  Even  on  Sundays  there  is 
no  holiday.  One  day  is  like  another  —  hard 
work,  and  wounds,  and  death  !  There  is  such  a 

similarity  that  at  times  we  lose  the  count  of  time. 
***** 

In  the  early  hours  of  the  morning  a  number  of 
the  men  came  trooping  into  the  tapestried  room 
bringing  with  them  their  booty,  by  means  of  which 
we  could  identify  the  regiments  opposite  us.  They 
were  a  cheery  crowd  to  have  so  lately  come  through 
the  doors  of  death.  With  blackened  faces,  from 
which  eyes  and  teeth  gleamed,  they  looked  for  all 
the  world  like  a  dress  rehearsal  of  a  Christy  Minstrel 
show.  As  they  lined  up  and  answered  to  the  roll 
call  one  almost  expected  to  hear  "  Massa  Johnson  " 
asking  his  brother  corner-man  some  old-time  conun- 


206        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

drum.  Then  they  were  met  with  a  hail  of  ques- 
tions, and  they  cheerfully  replied.  Some  one  asked 
if  it  was  exciting.  "  It  was  when  we  started,"  re- 
plied a  sturdy  non-com.,  smiling  through  his  burnt 
cork.  "  There  was  a  sapper  next  to  me  with  a  few 
pounds  of  gun-cotton  on  him  !  " 

Questions  having  been  asked  and  answered, 
we  sat  down  at  2  a.m.  to  a  supper  of  ham  and  eggs 
and  hot  coffee.  Our  thoughts  were  a  good  deal  with 
the  wounded  who  could  not  join  us,  and  mostly 
with  the  brave  young  leader  who  had  failed  to  see 
the  fruition  of  his  work.  It  was  a  small  affair  as  war 
goes  nowadays,  but  in  it  he  had  bravely  done  his 
duty  for  the  Motherland  that  he  had  possibly  never 
seen.  Next  morning  he  had  passed  beyond  all  the 
sights  and  sounds  of  war. 

***** 

The  night  raid  is  no  new  thing,  but  its  evolution 
from  a  tribal  affray  or  the  foray  of  a  clan  to  a  grim 
struggle  of  international  importance  is  a  quite 
recent  development.  And  the  plan  of  the  raid  of 
to-day  must  differ  from  the  plan  of  the  raid  of  to- 
morrow. Indeed,  if  you  are  to  deceive  the  wily 
Boche,  you  must  be  continually  varying  the  details 
of  your  raids.  The  enemy  must  never  know  what 
is  in  your  mind ;  he  must  not  realize  what  is  in 
store  for  him. 

The  Anzacs — and  probably  the  British  too — go 
through  a  course  of  systematic  training,  so  that  on 
the  eve  of  a  raid  they  are  not  only  physically  fit  but 
thoroughly  schooled  in  every  ruse  and  detail  of  its 


THE  RAIDERS  207 

organization.  The  extent  to  which  details  are 
thought  out  may  be  indicated  by  one  small  matter. 
Officers  and  men  taking  part  in  a  raid  are  now  sup- 
plied with  chewing-gum  !  Why  chewing-gum  ?  It 
appears  that  the  tension  of  waiting  during  a  furious 
bombardment  in  the  darkness  before  going  over  the 
parapet  produces  in  some  of  the  bravest  men  a  state 
of  nervous  strain  that  leads  to  coughing.  Once 
you  have  crawled  through  No-man's-land  and  are 
beginning  to  feel  your  way  beneath  a  hail  of  shrapnel 
and  machine-gun  bullets  towards  the  gap  that 
you  hope  your  guns  have  made  in  the  enemy's  wire, 
preparatory  to  hopping  his  parapet  and  engaging 
in  a  deadly  hand-to-hand  struggle,  a  cough  might 
cost  you  your  life.  If  you  could  smoke  you  would 
not  cough,  but  even  the  glow  from  a  cigarette-end 
might  betray  your  position,  and  your  career  might 
come  to  a  sudden  and  inglorious  end  at  the  hands 
of  some  Saxon  sniper  or  Bavarian  machine-gunner. 
For  that  reason  the  pipe  and  the  cigarette  are 
banned,  and  chewing-gum,  which  answers  all  the 
requirements,  has  been  substituted. 

It  is  a  strange  sight  to  see  men  in  these  days  of 
machines  going  literally  into  the  jaws  of  death, 
dribbling,  in  clear  daylight,  through  No-man's- 
land,  a  football  from  the  playing  fields  of  England. 
What  other  nation  in  all  the  world  would  think  of 
that  ?  And  yet  there  is  method  in  their  supposed 
madness.  It  gets  the  men  quickly  up  to  the  enemy's 
line,  and  so  long  as  the  ball  is  at  their  toe,  they 
will  have  little  concern  for  the  bullets.  Men  are 


208        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

actually  detailed  in  orders  to  dribble  the  ball  along, 
and  if  these  men  fall,  others  will  take  their  places. 
In  any  case  it  is  as  effective  and  far  more  sporting 
than  the  dope  given  to  the  German  infantry  before 
a  charge — not  indeed  that  many  of  the  German 
soldiers  require  a  dope,  for  they  are  brave  even  as 
our  own  men.  But  if  this  dribbling  of  a  football 
through  a  hail  of  shot  and  shell  is  one  of  the  strange 
sights  of  modern  war,  it  is  surely  no  less  strange  to 
see  a  hundred  stalwart  Anzacs  with  hands  and 
faces  blackened,  armed  to  the  teeth,  and  with  jaws 
vigorously  working  away  at  American  chewing-gum  ! 
It  is  one  other  way  in  which  the  United  States 
of  America  has  helped  us  in  the  great  cause  of 
humanity.  I  can  only  hope  that  in  disclosing  the 
plot  I  shall  not  be  the  humble  instrument  of  creating 
another  international  situation  and  a  further  series 
of  notes  between  President  Wilson  and  the  German 
Chancellor  !  Yet  there  is  no  saying  what  problems 
our  German  friends  may  not  evolve  out  of  the  publi- 
cation of  the  fact  that  British  soldiers  have  been 
indulging  in  the  practice  of  hopping  the  German 
parapets  with  American  chewing-gum  in  their 
mouths. 

In  their  early  raids  the  Germans  took  with  them 
into  our  trenches  long  sharp-bladed  knives  and 
strange-looking  knobkerries  with  chunks  of  iron  at 
the  business  end.  We  were  thus  driven  to  the 
devising  of  similar  implements  of  destruction.  In 
these  raids  the  Germans,  brave  as  they  are,  certainly 
did  not  get  any  change  out  of  the  Anzacs,  but  the 


THE  RAIDERS  209 

Anzacs  never  bore  them  any  malice.  So  long  as 
the  Germans  played  the  game,  our  men  played  the 
game  also. 

The  captor  and  the  captive  in  these  raids  make 
always  an  interesting  study.  Memories  crowd  in 
upon  one,  from  Egypt  and  Gallipoli  to  Armentieres, 
but  it  would  need  a  special  chapter  to  do  them 
justice.  One  scene  comes  vividly  before  my 
memory.  In  the  darkness  we  walked  along  the 
roads  and  through  the  fields  to  a  trench  within  our 
lines.  Meantime  the  bright  flares  were  shooting 
skyward  all  along  the  line,  indicating  clearly  the 
bend  of  the  salient  we  were  holding.  They  burst 
with  beautiful  effect,  illuminating  the  scene,  the 
German  flares  a  little  brighter  than  our  own,  and 
when  the  meteor-like  flashes  had  died  away,  the 
darkness  became  blacker  than  before.  We  reached 
a  dug-out  in  which  we  found  a  general,  a  colonel, 
some  other  officers,  and  the  telephonists  patiently 
waiting  the  course  of  events.  The  conversation 
in  such  situations  becomes  desultory  and  even  in- 
congruous. The  ring  of  a  telephone  acts  as  an 
almost  immediate  silencer,  for  the  situation  is  tense, 
and  the  actors  in  this  great  drama  of  darkness  and 
uncertainty  are  known  to  many  of  us.  Some  of  them 
we  know  we  shall  never  see  again.  Others  will 
come  back  with  wounds,  some  serious,  some  slight. 
In  our  crowded  dug-out  the  spasmodic  attempts 
at  gaiety  do  not  altogether  conceal  the  tense  anxiety 
that  is  felt.  It  is  a  positive  relief  when  a  man, 
looking  at  his  watch,  announces  that  the  bombard- 

p 


210        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

ment  is  due  in  half  a  minute.  One  counts  the  re- 
maining seconds.  Then,  with  a  simultaneous  burst 
of  sound,  the  guns  crash  and  thunder  in  unison. 
Risking  a  splinter  or  a  direct  hit,  we  leave  the  dug- 
out, and,  scrambling  on  to  a  mound  behind  the 
trench,  watch  the  splendid  scene.  The  roar  of  the 
guns  behind  and  in  front,  the  tearing  noise  of  the 
shells  through  the  air  overhead  and  on  either  side, 
the  loud  reports  with  which  they  burst  at  the  end 
of  their  journey,  the  dull  explosions  of  bombs,  the 
crack  of  rifles,  and  the  rat-tat-tat-ing  of  the  machine 
guns,  make  a  veritable  orgy  of  sound.  But  it  is  the 
flashing  illumination  of  the  guns  and  the  bursting 
shells  and  bombs  and  flares  that  interests  us  most. 
Scraggy  arms  of  shell-torn  trees  stand  revealed  in 
all  their  sad  semi-nakedness  under  the  flash  of  flare 
or  high  explosive.  Some  are  headless,  mere  shat- 
tered trunks  with  the  sap  of  their  former  strong 
life  drying  within  their  attenuated,  broken  bodies. 
Others  point  a  beckoning  hand  across  the  trench. 
But  always  they  retreat  again  into  the  gloom  of 
night  out  of  which  they  came.  Occasionally  a  flash 
reveals  the  ruin  of  some  farm-house,  the  crumbling 
walls  of  which  may  even  be  a  bit  of  our  trench. 
Gone  are  the  farmer  and  the  farmer's  wife,  and  his 
merry  children  who  used  to  string  a  daisy  chain  in 
these  scarred,  shell-pitted  fields  that  once  were 
trim  meadows,  where  sheep  and  cattle  grazed  con- 
tentedly. Now  the  grass  and  the  weeds  are  growing 
rank  in  all  the  narrow  battle  zone  ;  and  back  of 
the  lines,  and  in  between,  the  earth  is  pitted  with  the 


THE   RAIDERS  211 

foul  disease  of  war.  An  exploding  shell  unearths 
the  bones  of  some  British  soldier  buried  eighteen 
months  ago.  The  light  from  a  star-shell  reveals  a 
cross  on  which  we  read  "  An  Unknown  German  lies 
here."  Then  there  are  the  still  living  trees  as 
well  as  those  dead  and  dying.  These,  on  more 
fortunate  ground,  are  seen  in  silhouette  against 
the  sudden  brilliance  of  the  flares.  For  a  moment 
they  come  in  bold  relief  out  of  the  darkness ;  in  a 
moment  they  go  back  into  the  mirk  from  whence 
they  came.  For  a  full  hour  all  these  things  appear 
and  reappear.  Then  the  guns  "lift,"  and  continue 
their  destructive  work  farther  back. 

***** 

The  scene  changes.  The  first  of  the  captors  with 
his  prisoner  appears.  They  are  quite  a  friendly 
pair.  "  Don't  shoot  me  :  I  am  a  married  man  !  " 
said  the  German,  when  he  found  the  burly  Australian 
getting  to  close  quarters  with  him  in  the  trench. 
"  You're  all  right,  sonny  ;  you  just  come  along  with 
me,"  the  Australian  had  said,  patting  his  prisoner 
on  the  shoulder.  He  talked  excellent  English, 
this  German.  He  had  been  a  clerk  in  a  London 
office.  He  even  descended  to  the  vernacular. 
"  Bloody  clever !  your  raid,"  he  said,  "  bloody 
clever  !  "  And  so  it  was,  for  our  men,  by  a  clever 
ruse,  had  completely  deceived  the  Germans  as  to  the 
point  of  their  trenches  that  it  was  proposed  to  attack. 

In  the  dug-out  to  which  the  prisoner  was  taken 
his  letters  and  papers  were  examined  by  a  young 
Englishman  formerly  an  electric  engineer  in  Berlin  ! 


212        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

Such  things  are  possible  in  war,  and  Germany  is  not 
possessed  of  all  the  talents,  and  all  the  positions, 
even  in  Berlin,  however  much  we  British  may  be 
in  the  habit  of  crediting  her  with  them.  The 
prisoner  did  not  seem  to  mind  much  about  his  letters 
or  his  money.  What  he  wanted  most  was  the 
photographs  of  his  wife  and  children  that  he  carried 
with  him  in  his  pocket-book  into  the  trenches.  His 
wife  was  a  pretty  young  woman,  and  his  children 
were  beautiful — a  boy  and  a  girl.  Of  course  these 
pictures  were  promptly  handed  back  to  him.  Being 
British,  we  even  gave  him  back  his  money,  though  a 
young  Australian  officer  cast  longing  eyes  upon  a 
one-mark  note — a  system  of  currency  that,  with 
iron,  and  even  paper  coins,  for  some  time  now  has 
been  used  in  a  vain  attempt  to  upkeep  the  German 
credit.  The  one-mark  note  and  the  iron  money — 
a  ten-pfennig  piece — were  afterwards  purchased 
from  him,  at  their  full  value,  as  souvenirs.  The 
Australian  soldiers  even  gave  him  their  cigarettes 
and  their  own  food  and  tea.  One  wondered  how 
the  enemy  would  have  conducted  a  similar  incident. 
But  there  is  no  longer  any  need  to  wonder.  The 
taking  away  of  the  young  men  and  women  of  Lille  a 
few  months  ago,  and  the  killing  of  Captain  Fryatt 
in  cold  blood,  indicate  only  too  plainly  to  what 
depths  the  German  mind  and  method  can  still  de- 
scend. The  Captain  of  the  Great  Eastern  Company's 
liner  also  had  a  wife  and  children,  and  he  was, 
unlike  the  German  soldier  in  the  raided  trench,  not 
fair  game.  "  Don't  kill  me ;  I  am  a  married  man  !  " 


THE  RAIDERS  213 

is  a  sufficient  password  to  reach  the  heart  of  one 
of  our  Australian  soldiers,  whose  qualities  the  Ger- 
mans have  endeavoured  to  besmirch  in  lying  words. 
But  such  a  password,  even  from  an  innocent  non- 
combatant,  has  no  weight  with  the  German  Em- 
peror ! 

***** 

The  Maori,  who  is  naturally  a  born  raider,  has 
for  some  reason  or  other  been  turned  into  a  pioneer, 
but  he  wants  to  get  back  into  the  fighting.  He 
has  original  ideas  about  raiding,  a  form  of  warfare 
that  for  generations  was  practised  by  his  forefathers 
in  intertribal  warfare.  The  old  spirit  is  still  strong 
in  the  Maori,  and  the  love  for  the  weapons  of  the 
Stone  Age  remains  with  him.  The  jade  mere  of  his 
ancestor,  cut  and  polished  with  great  labour  in  the 
Stone  Age,  that,  with  him,  was  not  so  long  ago,  he 
still  knows  how  to  handle,  and  with  the  taiha  he 
could  no  doubt  still  deal  a  deadly  blow.  But  there 
is  no  jade  in  Flanders  or  Northern  France,  so  the 
Maori  has  set  himself  to  fashion  the  old  weapons 
anew.  He  has  obtained  billhooks  from  which  he 
has  filed  the  curving  top  and  then  sharpened  the 
rounded  end  to  a  razor  edge.  This  is  the  modern 
equivalent  of  the  mere  of  his  ancestors  ;  it  is  per- 
haps an  improvement  upon  it,  for  it  will  be  more 
effective. 

Among  my  friends  in  the  Maori  contingent  is  a 
doctor  who  had  a  brilliant  college  career.  I  believe 
his  materia-medica  paper  surprised  the  professor  who 
examined  it.  It  was  the  best  he  had  ever  dealt 


214        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

with.  This  doctor,  after  doing  fine  work  at  the 
front  in  Gallipoli,  has  now  exchanged  the  lancet 
for  the  sword,  and  is  in  the  ranks  of  the  combatants. 
When  I  last  saw  him  he  was  giving  a  warlike  band, 
whose  faces  did  not  require  any  burnt  cork,  a 
lesson  in  anatomy,  and  the  least  intelligent  of  his 
volunteers  now  knows  where,  in  close  combat,  he 
can  find  the  sub-clavian  or  the  carotid  artery  or  the 
temporal  of  the  thickest-skulled  and  toughest- 
skinned  Boche  that  ever  stepped  into  a  trench  in 
Northern  France.  In  addition  to  these  new  cuts 
and  thrusts,  the  Maori  can  still  deal  the  effective 
blows  that  the  earlier  pioneers  brought  with  them 
from  far  Hawaiiki,  the  mythological  home  of  their 
fathers.  The  temple-hit  was  well  known  to  the 
Maori  of  the  olden  time.  His  hit  was  made  with  an 
idea  of  severing  the  temporal  artery,  and  it  used  to 
end  with  a  screw  that  sometimes  took  off  the  top 
of  the  enemy's  head.  All  this  may  sound  somewhat 
terrible  if  you  don't  know  your  anatomy.  Really  it 
is  one  of  the  most  humane  ways  of  putting  your 
enemy  hors  de  combat,  a  method  in  comparison  with 
which  the  German  gassing  is  diabolical  in  the  ex- 
treme. Some  of  the  famous  greenstone  meres  with 
generations  of  history  behind  them  are  to  be  found 
in  the  museums  and  private  collections  of  New 
Zealand  and  England.  And  one  wonders  if  the 
new  mere,  used  against  the  invaders  of  Northern 
France  and  the  despoilers  of  Belgium,  will  find  an 
honoured  place  beside  the  old  historic  weapons  of  a 
chivalrous  foe. 


LAUNCHING  THE  GREAT 
ATTACK 

IT  is  the  first  of  July,  1916 — a  day  that  will  live  in 
history.  After  months  of  careful  preparation 
and  wonderful  organization  behind  the  lines,  a  great 
British  offensive  has  been  launched  against  the 
Germans  in  France.  Unexpectedly  the  French  are 
pushing  next  to  us  north  and  south  of  the  Somme. 
The  Germans  no  doubt  thought  they  had  finished 
them  at  Verdun.  The  surprise  was  all  the  more 
effective.  With  a  dash  and  a  determination  for 
which  they  were  ever  famous  the  splendid  French 
troops  in  this  great  event  have  been  remarkably 
successful  and  have  won  new  laurels. 

The  scope  of  this  combined  offensive  is  as  great 
as  it  is  important.  Apart  from  the  fighting,  the 
traffic  along  the  roads  is  in  itself  an  amazing  sight. 
Its  control  is  equally  wonderful.  Big  motor-lorries 
by  the  thousand  pass  and  repass  in  long  columns. 
Motor-cars,  carrying  staff  officers,  dash  along  the 
roads.  Motor-cyclists  flash  by.  Great  guns  with 
motor- tractors  on  caterpillar  wheels  crawl  across  the 

215 


216         LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

fields  like  Saurian  monsters.  Ammunition  columns 
advance  toward  the  firing  line,  and  motor-ambu- 
lances, their  red  crosses  half  hidden  in  a  coating  of 
dust,  running  smoothly  and  slowly,  return  laden 
with  the  human  wreckage  from  the  battlefields. 
High  above  the  cornfields  ugly  "  sausage  "  balloons 
strain  at  the  thin  ropes  of  steel  that  hold  them  cap- 
tive, the  observers,  sometimes  sick  with  the  con- 
tinuous swaying  motion,  watch  through  their  glasses 
the  slow  swing  of  the  battle  pendulum  down  below. 
Higher  still,  the  fast  battle-planes  gleam  in  the 
bright  sunlight,  or,  like  dark  birds  of  evil  omen, 
remain  for  a  time  silhouetted  against  a  silver  cloud. 
In  the  night  time  streams  of  troops  march  along 
the  dusty  roads  or  leave  the  trail  of  a  column  of 
fours  across  the  clover  and  the  wheat  fields — a  trail 
that  remains  visible  for  days.  It  is  all  very  wonder- 
ful— amazing  ! 

Day  and  night  without  intermission,  but  with 
varying  degrees  of  intensity,  the  preliminary  bom- 
bardment went  on.  In  many  places  it  blew  the 
German  trenches  to  bits.  It  changed,  as  if  with  a 
magician's  wand,  already  battered  French  villages 
held  by  German  soldiery  into  heaps  of  red  rubble. 
It  played  such  havoc  with  the  German  lines  of 
communication  that  it  was  with  difficulty  the  enemy 
got  food  and  water  up  to  the  firing  line.  Wounded 
and  unwounded  German  prisoners,  many  hundreds 
of  whom  we  saw,  had  in  their  faces  that  grey,  scared 
look  that  told  its  own  tale  of  torment  of  mind,  of 
bodily  fatigue,  and  of  shock  endured.  With  a 


LAUNCHING  THE  GREAT  ATTACK    217 

haunting  remembrance  of  the  ordeal,  they  said  it 
was  terrible.  They  were  a  mixed  lot — not,  of 
course,  seen  at  their  best — but  among  them  were 
numbers  of  fine  strapping  fellows.  Many  admitted 
that  Germany  could  not  now  win — the  most  they 
hoped  for  was  a  draw — but  in  any  case  the  war 
could  not  last  much  longer.  One  thing  was  certain, 
namely,  that  their  moral  had  been  shaken.  Few 
there  were  who  were  not  pleased  to  be  prisoners, 
fewer  still  who,  given  their  liberty,  would  care  to 
go  back. 

Day  and  night  we  watched  the  bombardment 
from  a  vantage  point  that  overlooked  the  battle- 
fields between  the  Somme  and  the  Ancre.  By 
day  it  was  a  spectacle  of  pillars  of  smoke  and  dust — 
by  night  a  scene  of  strange  glowing  lights  and 
flashing  illuminations.  And,  all  the  time,  the  grand 
arpeggio  of  the  guns !  The  intensity  of  sound 
varied  with  the  region  from  which  one  listened. 
The  air  was  tremulous  with  the  throbbing  pulsations 
of  hundreds  of  guns  of  different  calibres.  It  was 
altogether  different  from  the  bombardments  in 
Gallipoli  where  the  guns  of  the  ships  boomed  across 
the  sea  and  our  own  cannon  reverberated  amongst 
the  hills  and  dales.  It  was  different  also  from  the 
thunder  of  the  New  Zealand  batteries  further  north, 
where  an  intense  bombardment  crashes  and  echoes 
in  the  town  like  a  great  thunderstorm.  Here  in 
this  open,  gently-rolling  country  it  is  not  a  thunder 
but  rather  a  continuous  pulsation  of  sound  beating 
upon  the  ear  so  quickly  that  the  beats  become 


218        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

uncountable.  And  there  are  strange  variations 
in  the  waves  of  battle  sounds  according  as  they  are 
affected  by  configuration  of  country.  Currents 
and  pools  of  stagnant  air  also  play  their  incompre- 
hensible parts.  The  booming  of  the  bigger  guns  is 
said  to  have  been  heard  in  England  !  Here  they 
are  merged  in  the  one  gigantic,  continuous  pulsation. 
It  is  as  if  one  were  listening  to  the  heart-beats  of 
the  world  itself — to  the  pulsing  of  a  great  troubled 
heart  in  which  the  rhythm  was  broken  at  uncertain 
intervals  by  the  bursting  of  huge  fifteen-inch  howit- 
zer shells  and  the  explosions  of  great  mines  packed, 
literally,  with  tons  of  ammonal. 

The  volume  of  sound  reached  its  maximum  pitch 
when  hundreds  of  trench  mortars  all  along  the  line 
began  to  hurl  the  heavy  high  explosive  shells  to  fall 
in  graceful  curves  with  terrific  bursts  upon  German 
trench  and  parapet  and  wire  entanglement.  At 
last,  after  many  months  of  weary  waiting,  the  enemy 
was  getting  back,  with  compound  interest,  a  sample 
of  his  own  devilish  devices  for  the  destruction  of 
mankind. 

At  about  7.30  a.m.,  when  our  infantry  attack  was 
launched,  when  the  trench  mortars  ceased,  and  the 
guns  "  lifted  "  their  fire,  there  was  a  considerable 
diminution  in  the  din  which,  to  strained  ears,  had 
become  so  familiar.  Then  came  the  crack  of  rifle 
fire  and  the  devilish  tattoo  of  the  enemy  machine 
guns  as  our  men  climbed  over  the  parapets  into  what 
for  so  long  had  been  No-man's-land,  but  which  in  a 
few  minutes  now  became  ours.  These,  their  staccato 


LAUNCHING  THE  GREAT  ATTACK     219 

bursts  softened  by  distance,  came,  faintly,  through 
the  sound  of  our  own  cannonade  and  the  somewhat 
uncertain  and  hesitating  barrage  of  the  enemy 
gunners,  but  to  practised  ears  they  were  easily 
audible. 

The  grass  was  wet  with  dew  and  the  morning 
mists  hung  low  in  the  valley  and  on  the  slopes 
beyond  where  the  death-struggle  of  a  million  men 
was  now  begun  in  real  earnest.  The  smoke  and 
dust  of  battle  mingled  with  this  haze  and  blotted 
out  the  distant  landscape.  Gradually,  as  the  morn- 
ing wore  on,  the  visibility  increased.  And  presently 
out  of  the  thick  haze  we  could  see  down  below  in  the 
valley,  slowly  emerging,  the  toppling  golden  Virgin 
on  the  steeple  of  the  church  at  Albert,  bent  at  an 
angle  by  the  German  shelling,  face  downwards,  but 
still  holding  in  her  outstretched  hands  the  infant 
Christ.  Appearing  thus  out  of  the  mist  and  the 
smoke  of  battle  the  giant  figure,  still  held  up  upon 
its  bent  girders  of  iron,  seemed  a  mute  protest  against 
the  kultur  of  a  cruel  and  destroying  nation. 

From  that  day  the  great  attack  went  on,  at  times 
developing  into  a  series  of  battles.  One  would 
almost  have  thought  that  nothing  could  have  lived 
through  the  hail  of  shell  with  which  we  battered 
the  German  trenches.  Our  own  wounded,  and 
officers  and  men  whom  we  afterwards  saw  on  the 
actual  battlefield,  smilingly  confirmed  the  stories 
that  the  German  prisoners  had  told  us  with  haggard 
faces  and  still  frightened  eyes.  Yet  the  pick  and 
the  shovel  in  patient  toiling  hands  are  great  and 


220        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

effective  adjuncts  in  modern  war  to  the  bayonet 
and  the  gun,  and  the  enemy  had  used  them  to  some 
purpose  in  the  long  months  of  our  enforced  in- 
activity. Sheltering  in  their  deep  dug-outs  in  trench 
and  ruined  village,  many  Germans  saved  themselves 
and  their  machine  guns  long  after  trench  and  parapet 
and  parados  had  become  indistinguishable  the  one 
from  the  other,  and  long  after  hamlets  and  villages 
had  become  mere  heaps  of  red  rubble.  From  these 
machine  guns,  and  from  German  high  explosive 
and  shrapnel,  our  British  soldiers  met  in  many 
places  a  withering  and  destructive  fire  that  might 
well  have  dismayed  the  most  heroic  band,  the  while 
it  thinned  their  ever  onward-moving  ranks  and 
dotted  the  grassy  sward  of  No-man's-land  with  their 
dead. 

Yet,  in  spite  of  all  this,  we  were  now  the  masters 
of  the  vaunted  German  legions.  On  this  day  our 
brave  soldiers  feared  neither  man  nor  machine. 
They  went  into  action  with  a  glorious  courage 
unexcelled  in  any  war.  One  company  actually 
started  their  charge  dribbling  footballs  across  No- 
man's-land  ! 

As  on  the  earth  and  on  the  sea,  so  in  the  air  did  we 
obtain  the  mastery  and  the  initiative.  For  days 
now  the  German  balloons,  harried  by  our  airmen 
with  a  new  method  of  destruction,  had  been  falling 
in  flames,  their  observers  attempting  hurried  de- 
scents by  parachute  to  save  their  own  bodies  from 
fire  or  the  swift  and  sudden  fall.  Yet  all  along 
the  smoking  line  our  own  balloons  were  up,  making 


LAUNCHING  THE  GREAT  ATTACK    221 

calm  survey  above  the  battlefields.  With  electric 
wave  and  light  they  gave  the  ranges  to  our  thunder- 
ing guns,  scatheless  and  unalarmed.  Swinging 
high  above  the  valley  of  the  Somme  was  a  constella- 
tion of  twenty,  clear-cut  against  the  summer  blue. 
There  was  not  one  German  balloon  in  sight.  And 
no  German  plane  dared  cross  our  line.  Yet  here 
were  our  own  planes  flying  low  out  over  the  German 
trenches.  At  times  flights  of  half  a  dozen  droned 
overhead,  flying  with  deadly  purpose  on  some 
specially  destructive  and  hazardous  mission.  No 
wonder  that  a  few  days  later  the  German  squadron 
dropped  a  message  in  our  lines :  "  Please  give  your 
bloody  Flying  Corps  a  rest !  "  The  daring  of  our 
Corps  was  indeed  a  sight  for  gods  and  men. 

Many  gallant  deeds  were  done  in  those  first  days 
of  the  great  offensive,  and  if  there  were  a  hundred 
eyewitnesses  with  the  most  graphic  pens,  instead 
of  only  a  few  war  correspondents,  they  would  yet 
fail  to  do  justice  to  the  splendid  heroism  of  "  our 
contemptible  little  army." 


FRICOURT  AND  LA  BOISELLE 


great  Battle  of  the  Somme  along  an  ex- 
JL  tended  front  became  in  time  a  series  of 
battles.  Fierce  fighting  took  place  in  the  vicinity 
of  the  battered  villages  of  Fricourt  and  La  Boiselle 
—  strong  points  in  the  German  line  that,  for  a  time, 
held  up  our  attack.  This  was  really  a  battle  in 
itself,  and  the  writer  had  the  rare  good  fortune  to 
watch  it  from  an  adjacent  slope,  within  close  range, 
and  right  out  in  the  open.  It  was  a  unique  position 
from  which,  in  such  a  war  as  this,  a  non-combatant 
could  watch  the  progress  of  a  fierce  fight.  Indeed, 
we  were  able  to  observe  two  distinct  engagements 
that  were  going  on  at  the  same  time  —  the  final 
phase  of  the  capture  of  Fricourt  and  the  fight  for  the 
wood  behind,  and  the  even  more  gallant  and  desperate 
attack  on  La  Boiselle.  Well  within  a  complete 
circle  of  gun  fire,  and  even  within  the  range  of 
enemy  machine  guns  and  rifles,  had  they  cared  to 
shoot  in  our  direction,  we  could  follow  almost  every 
movement  of  our  troops,  in  places  even  with  the 
unaided  eye.  Both  villages  had  been  battered 
beyond  recognition  by  our  intensive  initial  bom- 

222 


FRICOURT  AND  LA   BOISELLE       223 

bardment,  but  the  enemy  still  clung  tenaciously  to 
the  positions.  Prisoners  said  afterwards  that  they 
had  been  told  to  hold  them  at  all  costs.  For  superb 
gallantry  in  the  face  of  great  odds  I  had  seen  nothing 
to  equal  the  storming  of  this  position  since  the 
attack  on  Chunuk  Bair,  Gallipoli. 

For  hours  our  bombardment  of  the  enemy 
trenches  and  the  ruins  of  these  villages  made  of 
them  a  veritable  inferno.  That  which  was  the 
German  front  line  trench  at  La  Boiselle  had  in 
places  become  almost  a  level  road.  Trees  in  the 
adjoining  woods  had  been  shot  to  bits,  and  brick 
and  mortar  had  crumbled  or  disappeared  in  clouds 
of  red  dust  till  all  the  houses  were  shapeless  ruins. 
Mametz,  a  village  to  the  right,  had  already  been 
taken,  and  our  troops  were  now  trying  to  get  round 
the  Fricourt  wood  from  there,  while  other  units 
were  endeavouring  to  join  with  them  round  the 
opposite  side. 

Gallant  work  was  done  at  Mametz  too.  The  men 
from  one  unit  got  into  the  German  line  with  a 
single  casualty,  and  were  in  the  second  line  with  only 
two  !  One  man  himself  took  twenty  prisoners. 
Other  troops  were  not  so  lucky.  They  came  up 
against  machine-gun  fire  and  were  heavily  bombed. 
In  one  spot,  lying  amongst  the  grass,  in  the  line  in 
which  they  were  advancing,  were  the  bodies  of  six 
men  and  a  little  dog — the  mascot  of  the  regiment — 
that  had  gone  into  the  fight  with  them.  One  regi- 
ment had  taken  many  prisoners  and  was  tremen- 
dously "  bucked  up."  Another  had  got  it  "in  the 


224        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

neck "  and  was  correspondingly  depressed ;  but 
each  continued  bravely  fighting,  and,  in  the  end,  the 
Germans  were  worsted. 

As  our  men  advanced  from  the  Mametz  position 
to  get  round  Fricourt  Wood  we  watched  the  German 
gunners  putting  a  long-sustained  barrage  of  high 
explosive  and  some  shrapnel  in  the  hollow  through 
which  they  had  to  pass,  yet  the  men,  gallantly  led, 
got  through.  The  enemy  also  crumped  our  firing 
line,  but  in  this  they  were  too  late  :  our  troops  had 
already  advanced.  "  Woolly  Bears "  that  burst 
with  a  peculiar  tearing  noise  were  mixed  with  the 
other  stuff.  Our  own  shelling  of  the  German  posi- 
tion had  been  most  effective.  An  officer  who  went 
next  day  in  to  a  German  redoubt  that  had  been  greatly 
strafed  found  it  a  heap  of  tumbled  earth.  Some 
cheery  pioneers  from  a  northern  county  were  already 
at  work  digging  a  communication  trench  soon  after 
our  troops  had  taken  the  German  line.  Laden  with 
their  more  peaceful  implements  of  war  and  beams 
of  stout  timber  they  streamed  down  into  the  hollow 
and  across  to  the  taken  position. 

When  we  arrived  on  the  scene  the  real  battle  for 
La  Boiselle  was  just  beginning,  and  the  last  of  the 
main  German  force  was  already  in  process  of  being 
cleared  out  of  Fricourt.  We  got  so  close  to  the  fight 
that,  without  our  glasses,  we  could  clearly  see  the 
troops  moving  into  action.  They  streamed  round 
one  corner  on  the  left  of  the  Fricourt  ruins  and 
swung  to  the  right  along  the  edge  of  the  wood. 
Others  came  up  out  of  the  hollow  of  the  valley  still 


FRICOURT  AND  LA  BOISELLE       225 

more  to  the  left.  These  also  advanced,  but  almost 
at  the  same  time  we  heard  the  crackle  of  a  machine 
gun,  and  could  see  that  they  were  held  up.  The  gun 
was  hidden  somewhere  in  the  wood.  Nearly  all  took 
shelter  on  the  edge  of  a  little  copse  at  a  place  that 
had  been  Fricourt  Farm.  The  trees  of  the  copse 
had  been  torn  and  dismembered  by  our  shell  fire. 
They  were  shattered  but  still  living  forms,  slowly 
bleeding  to  death. 

Still  farther  round  on  the  left,  on  the  crest  of  a 
ridge  overlooking  a  chateau  set  in  a  beautiful  wood, 
was  all  that  remained  of  La  Boiselle  after  our  guns 
had  fiercely  bombarded  it.  It  was  very,  very  little, 
but  such  ruined  villages,  however  heavily  bombarded, 
can  still  shelter  an  enemy  that  has  made  deep  dug- 
outs. In  these,  invariably,  both  men  and  machine 
guns  are  saved,  and  such  positions  take  a  great  deal 
of  clearing  up  in  an  advance.  In  one  case  our  men 
went  right  through  a  village — so  quick  was  their 
onrush — and  afterwards  the  enemy  came  out  of 
cellars  and  dug-outs  and  fought,  though,  against 
the  splendid  valour  of  our  troops,  they  failed  to  save 
the  position.  Many  of  the  Germans  who  remained 
in  that  village  were  killed  and  wounded.  The  others 
quickly  transformed  themselves  into  "  Kamarads  " 
and  held  up  their  hands  in  surrender. 

While  our  attacking  force  was  sheltering  at  the 
end  of  Fricourt  Wood  our  gunners  were  mercilessly 
shelling  the  La  Boiselle  position,  still  strongly  held 
by  the  Germans  and  commanded  by  their  artillery 
as  well  as  by  our  own.  Our  high  explosive  tore  the 

Q 


226        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

earth  relentlessly,  sending  up  great  bursts  of  smoke 
and  showers  of  earth,  and  the  already  broken  brick 
walls  of  shop  and  cottage  disappeared  in  clouds  of 
dust.  At  intervals  a  big  shrapnel  shell  would  burst 
in  the  air,  spattering  the  ground  with  its  pellets  and 
leaving  behind  it  a  pretty  rolling  cloud  of  light, 
greyish-green  smoke.  That  no  doubt  was  to  catch 
any  German  who  might  take  it  into  his  head  to  run 
for  better  shelter.  But  all  the  time  we  watched  not 
a  man  showed  himself.  So  terrible  was  the  shelling 
that  one  would  have  thought  nothing  could  have 
lived  within  its  zone.  And  for  hours  this  ruthless 
"  preparation  "  for  our  advance  went  on. 

Down  on  the  left,  at  the  corner  of  the  wood,  a 
battery  of  heavy  guns  with  fine  teams  of  black 
horses  swung  into  action  right  in  the  open.  This 
was  a  splendid  and  a  cheering  sight,  and  one  unex- 
pected in  this  war  of  trench  and  wire  and  dug-out. 
More  of  our  guns  had  been  shifted  up  in  the  night. 
Just  in  front  of  us,  in  new  emplacements  at  what 
had  been  the  German  front-line  trench,  there  was 
a  battery  already  established  in  its  new  emplace- 
ments. 

On  the  reverse  slope  of  the  Fricourt-La  Boiselle 
ridge  our  men  were  nonchalantly  walking  about, 
and  stretcher-bearers  were  going  and  coming  in  the 
open.  Among  the  uniforms  I  noticed  some  of  un- 
expected grey,  and,  looking  through  glasses,  I  saw 
that  they  were  German,  but  in  them  were  German 
prisoners.  There  must  have  been  a  whole  company 
of  them.  Under  the  gleaming  bayonets  of  half  a 


FRICOURT  AND  LA  BOISELLE       227 

dozen  guards,  they  were  marched  down  the  valley 
to  a  barbed-wire  enclosure  well  away  from  the  battle- 
ground. Other  "  Tommies "  were  bringing  in 
prisoners  in  twos  and  threes  from  the  captured 
trenches.  At  intervals,  for  fully  half  an  hour,  we 
watched  one  humorist  slowly  bringing  in  his  prize. 
The  prisoner  seemed  to  be  shamming  and  was 
reluctant  to  come.  Apparently  he  thought  he  was 
going  to  his  doom.  There  would  be,  at  times,  an 
argument  in  which  a  threatening  bayonet  played  a 
part.  An  impatient  and  less  humane  man  might 
have  finished  the  argument — and  the  prisoner — with 
a  bullet,  but  this  "  Tommy "  persevered.  He 
compelled  the  German  to  cross  the  trenches  in  front 
of  him,  and  when  it  was  his  turn  to  clamber  up  the 
far  side  he  made  his  prisoner  stretch  out  his  hand 
and  pull  him  up. 

The  position  at  Fricourt  and  La  Boiselle  continued 
to  be  intensely  interesting.  Even  though  our  stand- 
point was  so  excellent,  emboldened  by  our  success, 
we  ventured  along  a  little  farther  to  where  some  of 
our  soldiers  were  lying  on  the  yellow  earth  of  a 
communication  trench.  The  group  constituted  an 
artillery  forward  observation  post,  and  was  made  up 
of  a  colonel,  a  major,  one  or  two  junior  officers,  and 
some  signallers.  Among  them  was  a  big,  handsome 
Australian  whose  father  had  been  a  Broken  Hill 
millionaire.  When  the  war  broke  out  he  was  in 
England,  and  had  joined  the  Artillery.  At 
present  he  seemed  to  be  thoroughly  enjoying  him- 
self. 


228        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

'  For  some  hours  we  lay  beside  these  men  watching 
the  wonderful  battle  spectacle  and  listening  to 
messages  coming  and  going  over  the  field  telephone. 
Expressions  of  delight  alternated  with  orders  and 
messages  to  and  from  the  guns.  "  There's  another 
blighter  !  "  "  His  hands  are  up  !  His  hands  are 
up  !  "  "  There's  another  in  a  long  coat  surrender- 
ing— between  the  Crucifix  and  the  Poodle  !  "  There 
was  a  good  deal  of  the  Crucifix  and  the  Poodle.  The 
latter  turned  out  to  be  a  woolly-looking  tree  on  the 
far  ridge  just  in  front  of  the  other  German  line.  The 
Crucifix  was  a  real  Crucifix  still  standing  against  the 
horizon  amidst  a  small  clump  of  naked  trees.  It  is 
strange  how  many  crucifixes  escape  shell  fire,  and 
such  as  do  are  regarded  by  the  French  with  super- 
stitious awe. 

Interspersed  with  the  talk  of  the  observers  were 
phrases  of  a  more  technical  kind,  such  as  "  putting 
number  four  gun  on  to  Burnham  Wood,"  or  "  num- 
ber three  on  to  x  20  ak  16,"  "  dropping  twenty-five," 
or  "  twenty  minutes  left  or  right  "  as  the  case  might 
be.  The  Germans  were  shelling  our  troops  in  a  place 
these  enthusiasts  called  Lozenge  Wood — it  was  no 
longer  a  wood :  it  was  a  sand  heap — and  our  aforesaid 
guns  were  now  cheerfully  worrying  the  enemy  just 
over  the  ridge.  The  shells  tore  past  us,  and  we 
watched  them  bursting  over  the  crest.  Our  infantry 
had  been  into  Crucifix  trench,  and  others  advancing 
to  the  further  attack  were  now  held  up  at  the  Poodle. 
The  shelling  was  to  allow  them  to  go  on.  This  they 
afterwards  did,  and  by  next  day  the  whole  of 


FRICOURT  AND  LA  BOISELLE       229 

Fricourt  Wood  was  surrounded  and  the  position 
made  good. 

Another  Battery  Commander  wished  to  know  over 
the  'phone  if  he  could  chip  in,  but  the  officer  replied, 
"  No  ;  Major  Blank's  battery  will  do  the  necessary." 
It  was  very  much  as  if  a  man  were  sitting  in  his 
office  ordering  a  ton  of  coal  for  his  household  or 
arranging  a  deal  in  shares  or  produce.  They  could 
not,  of  course,  see  their  own  guns.  Neither  could 
the  gunners  see  what  they  were  shooting  at — it  was 
all  done  with  an  almost  uncanny  scientific  accuracy 
from  the  map  and  from  observation  in  this  forward 
station. 

The  position  at  Fricourt  having  been  satisfactorily 
cleared  up,  we  again  turned  our  attention  on  La 
Boiselle,  which  was  now  more  than  ever  being  lashed 
with  a  storm  of  shells.  Other  batteries,  including 
some  "  heavies  "  far  back,  were  attending  to  this. 
It  seemed  as  if  the  gunners  had  warmed  to  their 
work,  and  one  could  picture  them  stripped  to  the 
shirt,  working  with  energy  and  enthusiasm,  as  shell 
after  shell  went  tearing  toward  the  enemy  trenches. 

Their  shelling  was  terribly  accurate  and  dreadfully 
effective.  Presently  they  ceased  from  high  explo- 
sive, banged  in  a  perfect  tornado  of  shrapnel,  and 
then  suddenly  "  lifted."  From  this  we  knew  that 
the  infantry  attack  was  on  the  point  of  being 
launched,  and  surely  enoughin  a  few  minutes'  time 
we  saw  the  first  of  the  men  debouching  from  a 
shattered  communication  trench  and  creeping  up 
across  a  still  more  battered  German  trench  in  the 


230        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

direction  of  what  had  been  the  village.  Others 
followed,  and  soon  there  was  a  little  group  in  a  very 
exposed  position  waiting  for  their  chance  to  go 
forward.  The  German  gunnery  at  this  stage  of  the 
battle  was  magnificent.  The  position  had  been 
accurately  registered,  and  a  solitary  German  bal- 
loon far  away  behind  the  woods  of  the  distant 
ridge  was  observing. 

Looking  from  our  grand-stand  position  on  the 
hillside,  it  seemed  as  if  no  troops  on  God's  earth 
could  ever  come  safely  through  such  a  barrage. 
"  My  God  !  that's  pitiless  shrapnel  at  La  Boiselle," 
said  the  man  beside  me.  But  all  the  time  as  we 
looked  British  troops  were  passing  through  it. 
Raked  by  machine  gun  and  rifle  fire,  stunned  and 
blown  to  bits  by  high  explosive,  and  pelted  with 
the  bursting  shrapnel,  many  fell  but  none  wavered. 
It  was  an  exhibition  of  dauntless  courage  and  self- 
sacrifice  that  one  might  well  have  risked  one's  own 
life  to  see.  We  did  not  know  what  troops  they  were 
— clerks  and  artisans  and  labourers  probably,  led 
by  young  fellows  only  a  year  or  two  away  from  the 
public  schools  and  'Varsities.  We  did  not  even 
trouble  to  ask.  Sufficient  for  us  from  the  distant 
lands  of  the  Empire  was  it  that  they  were  British 
lads  turned  into  soldiers  in  a  year,  and  that  their 
magnificent  and  undaunted  courage  was  typical 
of  the  high  moral  to  which  "  the  contemptible  little 
army  "  had  attained. 

The  German  gunners  continued  to  put  a  deadly 
barrage  into  the  hollow  on  the  left  in  an  endeavour 


FRICOURT  AND  LA  BOISELLE       231 

to  stop  the  advance.  They  shot  also  at  the  little 
group  crouching  on  the  white  chalky  rubble  of  a 
damaged  trench  where  they  were  finding  all  too 
inadequate  shelter.  The  ground  was  whipped  with 
shrapnel  and  high  explosive,  and  a  German  machine 
gunner  who  had  lived  through  our  fire  now  gallantly 
emerged  from  his  shelter  and  began  firing.  Now 
there  was  also  the  crackle  of  rifle  fire  mingling  with 
the  reports  of  the  guns  that  were  shooting  all 
around  us,  and  with  the  noise  of  the  bursting  shells 
immediately  in  front.  One  felt  very  sorry  for  the 
little  group  of  brave  men  crouching  there  in  the 
open.  Presently  there  was  a  burst  of  shell  beside 
them  and  a  second  right  over  them.  For  a  moment 
they  were  obliterated  by  the  smoke  and  the  whipped- 
up  dust.  When  it  cleared  we  saw  man  after  man 
get  up,  and,  crouching  low,  advance  into  the  village 
in  face  of  the  machine-gun  fire  from  the  leafless 
wood  and  the  ruined  houses.  Some  seven  or  eight 
there  were  who  did  not  move.  They  lay  in  strangely 
huddled  attitudes,  motionless  on  the  light  earth  of 
the  battered  trench.  Next  day  they  were  still  there 
in  the  same  positions.  Death  had  caught  them  in 
the  very  hour  of  victory.  But  other  gallant  fellows 
came  on  through  the  pitiless  hail  of  German  shrapnel 
to  take  their  places.  They  came  singly  and  in  twos 
and  threes.  Some  dropped,  but  there  was  no 
flinching,  no  turning  back.  It  was  all  very,  very 
sad,  but  finely  inspiriting,  and  it  made  the  pulses 
thrill.  One  felt  proud  to  be  of  the  breed.  In  this 
manner  did  we  gain  our  footing  in  La  Boiselle. 


232        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

The  boom  of  the  guns  and  the  crash  and  crump 
of  bursting  shells  continued,  and  our  droning  battle 
planes,  wheeling  overhead,  surveyed  the  scene  with 
an  immeasurable  scorn  for  the  German  shrapnel. 
The  open  trench  beside  which  we  lay  was  like  a 
wound  in  the  meadow.  The  gentle  grassy  slope 
above  and  below  was  gay  with  red  poppies,  blue 
cornflowers,  and  white  daisies — the  colours  of 
England  and  of  France — swallows  and  butterflies 
were  flitting  about  in  the  clear  sunshine,  and,  in  the 
blue  above,  a  soaring  lark  was  putting  all  his  soul 
into  his  song. 


GOLFERS  FROM  THE  SEA 

IF  you  have  been  squatting  on  the  sea  bottom 
not  a  mile  from  Heligoland  for  two  days  and 
have  been  fired  at  and  chased  and  otherwise  inhos- 
pitably received,  you  naturally  crave  for  some  form 
of  recreation.  That  explains  why  the  Z.  77  is  vainly 
endeavouring  to  call  up  H.M.S.  Outrageous,  and 
also  why  her  signalman  is  muttering  cutting  remarks 
about  the  somnolence  of  signalmen  on  bigger  ships. 
From  the  vitals  of  the  submarine  comes  a  voice. 
"  Got  'em  yet,  Evans  ?  "  "  'E's  just  woke  up, 
sir/'  says  Evans,  and  proceeds  to  spell  out  a  message 
with  the  aid  of  two  large  semaphore  flags.  This  is 
the  message  :  "  Lieutenant  X.,  Outrageous, — Will 
give  you  two  bisques  and  knock  spots  off  you. — 
Tubby." 

Half-way  through  the  receiving  signalman  on  the 
big  ship  became  wildly  excited.  "  And  'im  twelve 
years  in  the  Navy  and  can't  send  biscuits  right,"  he 
snorted.  Then  he  left  the  bridge  and  dived  below  to 
where  a  rather  bored  kitten  and  the  gunnery  lieu- 
tenant were  amusing  themselves  with  a  piece  of 
string  and  a  ball  of  paper.  "  Message  from  Z.  77, 

233 


234        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

sir/'  said  the  signalman,  standing  in  the  ward-room 
door.  "  Received  9.27  a.m.  Will  give  you  two 
biscuits  and  knock  spots  off  you. — Tubby."  Fora 
moment  the  lieutenant  looked  as  puzzled  as  the 
signalman  at  the  message.  Suddenly  its  meaning 
dawned  on  him.  "  Say  that  I  will  pick  up  Lieu- 
tenant Watkins  in  five  minutes,"  he  said,  "  and,  by 
the  way,  that  word  wasn't  biscuits.  You  let  your 
mind  run  on  food  too  much,  Semple." 

A  little  later  a  cutter  called  at  Z.  77  and  took  the 
two  officers  and  their  golf  clubs  ashore.  As  they 
landed  on  the  narrow  beach  a  tall  major  of  marines 
sauntered  down  and  gazed  with  open  hostility  at  the 
kit  of  clubs  slung  over  each  shoulder.  He  addressed 
the  gunnery  lieutenant.  tl  What  were  you  doing  in 
the  Great  War,  daddy  ?  "  he  said  mildly,  and 
departed  under  a  shower  of  small  pebbles.  The 
marine  officer  had  to  work,  so  it  was  entirely  a  case 
of  sour  grapes  with  him. 

An  extraordinary  thing  is  this  craze  for  strenuous 
amusement  possessed  by  the  average  Briton.  On 
the  way  up  to  the  first  tee  the  golfers  passed  a  foot- 
ball ground  where  twenty- two  brawny  "  matlows  " 
were  sweating  and  puffing  in  the  endeavour  to  force 
a  ball  between  two  upright  posts.  Yesterday  most 
of  these  men  had  come  tearing  through  the  Cattegat 
with  an  excellent  chance  of  striking  anything  from  a 
mine  to  a  "U  "  boat  on  the  run.  They  had  had  but 
little  rest  in  the  last  three  days,  and  normally  they 
should  have  been  sleeping  the  sleep  of  the  just.  It 
is  the  same  behind  the  lines  in  France.  The  natural 


GOLFERS   FROM  THE  SEA  235 

antidote  for  hard  work  and  overstrained  nerves  is 
hard  play,  and  so  these  men,  who  should  by  rights 
turn  in  to  their  bunks  and  hammocks  directly  they 
come  back  to  harbour,  don  flannels  or  shorts,  and 
spend  lavishly  all  the  energy  that  has  been  left  to 
them  after  a  week  of  watching  in  North  Sea  weather. 
As  our  two  golfers  tramp  the  links  the  commander 
of  the  Outrageous  is  stretched  full  length  amongst 
the  heather  lining  the  bank  of  one  of  the  Highland 
streams  ten  miles  away.  Below  him  in  a  deep  brown 
pool  is  such  a  trout  as  will  make  his  reputation  in  the 
ward-room  for  all  time,  and  he  is  painfully  wriggling 
to  a  position  from  which  he  can  lob  his  fly  gently  into 
the  ripple  above. 

The  submarine  man's  drive  from  the  first  tee  is 
long  and  low,  with  a  run  that  takes  him  within  easy 
mashie  shot  of  the  green.  The  gunner's  ball  rises 
at  an  angle  of  about  sixty  degrees  to  an  extraordinary 
height,  and  falls  to  earth  so  close  to  the  tee  that  its 
thud  as  it  hits  the  turf  is  distinctly  audible.  "  That/' 
says  he  pensively,  "  must  be  my  maximum  eleva- 
tion. ' '  And  so  they  play  light-hearted  as  schoolboys. 
Their  golfing  talk  is  mixed  with  the  queer  jargon  of 
the  Navy.  "  Guns  "  calls  his  cleek  his  secondary 
armament,  and  the  other  man  talks  in  a  like  way. 
"  I  will  now  submerge,"  he  says,  as  he  faces  his  ball 
in  an  attempt  to  hole  a  five-foot  putt.  But  he 
doesn't.  At  a  blind  hole  "  Guns  "  is  again  troubled. 
"  These  indirect  drives  are  the  very  devil.  It's  like 
smacking  away  at  Maidos  over  about  ten  miles  of 
Gallipoli."  He  had  been  on  the  bombarding 


236         LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

squadron  out  there.  It  is  only  a  nine-hole  course, 
so  when  they  have  played  once  round  they  start 
off  again. 

At  the  sixth  tee  a  perspiring  orderly  appears  with 
a  message.  The  submarine  man  reads  it  and  groans. 
"I'm  off,"  he  says,  and  off  he  is,  leaving  "  Guns  "  to 
finish  his  game  alone.  .  .  . 

Well  out  in  the  North  Sea  an  ugly  craft  wallows 
in  the  swell.  She  has  an  assignation  with  a  small 
black-funnelled  destroyer  that  presently  appears. 
Bashfully  the  submarine  sinks  below  the  waves  like 
some  coy  maiden  discovered  bathing.  Her  periscope 
alone  remains  above  the  surface.  The  former  golfer 
is  standing  with  his  eye  glued  to  the  lens  of  the 
graticuled  periscope  sight.  He  is  satisfied,  and 
suddenly  there  is  a  thud  and  a  rush  that  tells  that  a 
torpedo  has  started  on  its  way.  The  tanks  are  filled, 
and  the  boat  submerges  completely,  waiting  for  the 
concussion  of  the  water  that  should  follow.  She 
stays  down  the  allotted  time  for  the  range,  but 
nothing  happens,  and  slowly  she  rises  again  to  the 
surface.  As  the  periscope  prism  gets  above  the 
water  and  catches  the  target  in  its  field,  the  golfer 
looks  disgustedly  at  the  smudge  of  smoke  that  marks 
the  retreating  destroyer. 

"  Sliced,  begad  !  "  he  says,  and  gives  the  order  to 
return  to  harbour. 

That  night,  in  the  ward-room  where  he  is  dining 
as  a  guest,  the  commander  tells  the  tale  of  a  Brob- 
dignagian  trout  that  dallied  with  a  coachman  and 
toyed  with  a  blue  drake,  until  by  wonderful  strategy 


GOLFERS  FROM  THE  SEA  237 

it  was  hooked,  only  to  get  free  after  a  Titanic 
struggle.  "  My  fish  got  away,  too/'  muses  the 
submarine  man,  but  he  doesn't  tell  his  story.  It 
is  a  commonplace  beside  the  commander's. 


THE  COAST-GUARD 

If  you  win  through  an  African  jungle, 
Unnoticed  at  home  in  the  Press, 

Heed  it  not,  no  man  seeth  the  piston, 
But  it  driveth  the  ship  none  the  less. 

THE  WARD-ROOM  LITANY. 

WAR  saw  us  unprepared  on  land,  and  but 
partly  prepared  on  sea,  but  mechanical 
genius  and  general  adaptability  have  made  up  for 
our  unpreparedness  to  an  extent  that  one  only 
realizes  after  a  visit  to  the  East  Coast  defences. 

Before  the  war  a  fishing  town  basked  in  the 
sunshine  of  prosperity.  Rich  harvests  from  the  sea 
brought  comfort  to  these  hardy  fishermen.  Now 
their  harvest  is  a  grimmer  one  and  they  rake  the  seas 
for  the  spawn  of  death ;  mines  and  torpedoes  are 
their  catches,  and  hardship  and  incessant  watching 
their  lot. 

Not  all  the  craft  boast  a  tonnage  of  thousands, 
but  they  are  none  the  less  important.  Lining  the 
quays  there  is  a  fleet  that  boasts  no  grey  paint,  and 
there  is  not  enough  brass  there  to  make  a  candlestick. 
The  skippers  of  these  vessels  have  no  gold  lace  on 
cap  or  sleeve.  They  wear  canvas  jackets,  occa- 

238 


THE  COAST-GUARD  239 

sionally  they  boast  earrings,  and  their  hands  are 
rough  with  the  salt  rime  and  the  handling  of  the  sea 
harvest.  These  are  the  trawlers,  his  Majesty's 
trawlers,  the  men  who  gather  in  the  sowings  of  the 
German  submarines  and  minelayers  Since  March 
they  have  accounted  for  460  German  mines,  and 
they  are  proud  of  their  work. 

***** 
There  is  a  man  on  this  coast,  a  Galahad  of  the 
fishermen.  His  name  matters  not,  but  he  is  the 
skipper  of  the  King  Stephen.  He  is  a  hard  man, 
and  he  speaks  of  the  Germans  as  he  would  speak  of 
scorpions.  He  made  up  his  mind  that  he  would 
wage  his  part  of  the  war  as  war,  and  "  God  help  the 
Germans  whom  he  met."  In  good  time  he  did  meet 
a  German,  several  of  them,  in  a  "  U  "  boat.  He 
opened  fire  at  short  range,  for  the  enemy  had  not 
held  him  in  much  esteem,  but  had  made  suggestions 
about  "  taking  to  boats."  The  skipper  of  the 
trawler  had  other  views,  and  his  first  round  swept  a 
sailor  from  the  deck  of  the  submarine  with  one  leg 
less  than  Nature  gave  him.  His  third,  fourth,  and 
fifth  struck  the  conning  tower,  and  the  enemy  sank 
slowly,  leaving  bubbles  and  oily  patches  on  the 
smooth  sea.  There  were  other  submarines  about, 
and  the  skipper  of  the  trawler  gave  orders  to  make 
off,  but  above  his  orders  sounded  the  wail  of  the 
wounded  German  sailor,  and  the  skipper  forgot  his 
hatred,  hearing  the  call  of  one  man  to  another. 
Without  stopping  to  deliberate  he  went  over  the  side 
to  rescue  his  erstwhile  foe,  and  he  brought  him  safely 


240        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

on  board.  What  do  the  men  who  shelled  our  help- 
less "  E  "  boat's  crew  in  the  Baltic  think  of  this  ? 

At  the  beginning  of  the  war  it  was  soon  seen  that 
it  would  be  necessary  to  keep  an  open  channel  for 
shipping.  A  safe  trade  route  must  be  kept  clear. 
Hence  this  trawler  fleet  was  organized,  and  in  these 
last  twenty-two  months  21,000  ships  used  this 
channel,  and  of  the  ones  that  kept  to  orders  and 
obeyed  instructions  only  three  met  mishap. 

Indiscriminate  mine-laying  was  always  a  devilish 
device,  but  the  German  has  excelled  his  master. 
Now  he  lays  mines  from  submarines,  and  to  do  this 
these  vessels  need  not  come  to  the  surface.  They 
can  creep  to  a  trade  route,  fathoms  below  the  ken  of 
watching  patrols,  there  to  spew  up  these  engines  of 
destruction.  The  German  mine  is  of  ingenious 
construction  and  depends  on  six  soft  metal  horns  for 
detonation.  Inside  these  horns  are  bottles  contain- 
ing sulphuric  acid.  On  contact  with  a  ship's  hull 
the  horns  bend  and  the  bottles  break,  liberating  the 
acid,  which  indirectly  causes  the  explosion. 

When  a  mine  is  found  it  is  treated  with  deference, 
and  any  tendency  towards  affectionate  approaches 
is  discountenanced  with  a  boat-hook.  It  is  not 
always  that  these  fishermen  realize  their  potentiali- 
ties, however,  and  not  long  ago  an  earringed  salt  of 
the  old  school  made  a  tow-rope  fast  to  one  of  these 
detonating  horns  and  towed  it  fourteen  miles  to 
harbour,  where  he  delivered  it  to  the  authorities,  who 
watched  the  latter  part  of  his  performance  aghast. 
Yet  another  of  his  kind  retrieved  a  mine  and  brought 


THE  COAST-GUARD  241 

it  into  harbour.  He  took  it  alongside  a  cruiser  there 
and  proudly  announced  his  discovery.  f<  Take  the 
thing  away  from  here,"  shouted  the  horrified  officer 
of  the  watch.  "  It  bean't  dangerous/'  countered 
the  discoverer.  "  Oi've  been  and  knocked  off  all 
them  spoiks  with  a  boat-'ook."  And  he  had. 

Cheek  by  j  owl  with  the  trawlers  lay  a  grey-painted 
mother  ship  to  a  fleet  of  submarines  clustered  around 
her  affectionately.  A  smiling  officer  invited  inspec- 
tion of  his  ewe-lamb.  "  It's  really  quite  roomy 
when  you  know  your  way  about,"  he  said,  "  and  the 
motion's  delightful."  A  submarine  is  an  elongated 
cigar-shaped  metal  case.  The  man  who  designs  her 
fills  her  full,  quite  full,  of  machinery.  He  then 
remembers  that  he  has  to  put  twenty-two  men  in 
her  and  he  takes  out  some  of  the  machinery,  leaving 
three  spaces  about  6  feet  square,  always  taking  care 
there  shall  be  sufficient  excrescences  to  make  the 
men  careful  how  they  walk.  In  the  largest  space, 
referred  to  airily  as  the  mess,  there  is  an  electric 
stove  that  would  delight  a  housewife.  The  stove 
naturally  suggests  that  it  is  for  cooking  when  sub- 
merged, but  the  commander  dispels  the  theory. 
"  The  men  would  like  to  cook,"  he  says,  "  but  you 
can't  have  the  reek  of  cabbage  and  stew  when  you're 
below  ;  our  ordinary  stinks  are  enough." 

Above  the  fish-backed  structure  called  a  deck  a 
voice  is  heard  remarking  carefully  that  he  is  off  on 
a  "  stunt  "  in  an  hour's  time.  What  he  means  is 
that  he  will  leave  harbour  and  make  for  the  open  sea 
in  the  direction  of  the  enemy  coast.  He  will  perhaps 


242        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

submerge  and  nose  his  way,  all  by  sense  of  touch, 
through  German  minefields,  and  at  the  end  lie 
"  doggo  "  on  the  bottom  with  the  shadows  of  the 
War  Lord's  cruisers  playing  on  his  hull.  In  his  own 
time  he  will  rise,  and  when  his  periscope  prism  breaks 
the  surface  he  will  have  perhaps  five  seconds  to  form 
his  course  of  future  action. 

Quiet,  unassuming  men  these  that  go  under  the 
sea  in  ships.  They  do  things  that  would  wreck  a 
soldier's  nerves  in  an  hour,  but  they  literally  "  come 
up  smiling,"  perhaps  a  little  tired-eyed  and  with 
throbbing  temples,  but  without  an  idea  that  they  are 
doing  more  than  their  duty. 


THE  BATTLE  CRUISERS 

THERE  are  those  who  lament  the  loss  of  all  that 
is  beautiful  on  the  sea,  and  scathingly  compare 
the  modern  Liverpool  tramp  with  the  three-decker 
of  long  ago.  They  ask  you  to  look  at  the  peeling 
paint  and  rusty  sides,  the  squat  masts  and  canted 
derricks,  and  against  these  they  hold  up  the  white 
decks  and  whiter  sails,  the  yellow  masts  and  yards 
of  the  ships  of  long  ago.  And  comparison  finds  the 
palm  awarded  to  the  old-timer. 

But  there  is  a  new  beauty,  a  beauty  of  strength 
and  power  and  speed  that  has  been  given  us  in  the 
modern  war- vessel.  In  a  northern  port  the  morning 
mists  rise  slowly,  unevenly,  and  through  the  uncer- 
tain haze  the  lead-coloured  silhouettes  of  great 
ships  loom  up.  These  are  no  walls  of  oak.  They 
are  gun  emplacements  of  steel,  ponderous  and  for- 
bidding if  you  will,  but  with  a  beauty  of  their  own. 
And  as  the  haze  lifts  the  eye  lifts  with  it,  following  a 
vista  of  ships  as  far  as  sight  may  carry.  Unwieldy 
funnels,  tripod  masts,  fire-control  platforms,  hellish 
weapons  in  steel  fortresses  appear  in  long  lanes. 

It  is  as  though  the  curtain  had  been  unrolled  to 

243 


244        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

show  the  very  incarnation  of  war,  the  climax  of 
man's  devilish  ingenuity.  It  is  a  city  of  steel  with 
its  streets,  its  squares,  and  its  byways,  the  home  of 
many  souls.  High  above  these  floating  fortresses 
spider-web  wires  stretch  from  mast  to  mast,  the 
nerves  of  this  huge  fleet.  On  the  quarter-deck  of 
one  ship  a  man  walks  meditatively,  his  hands 
clasped  behind  him.  He  is  very  much  a  man.  True 
he  has  an  extra  inch  of  gold  lace  on  his  sleeve,  the 
breast  of  his  blue  tunic  is  brightened  by  coloured 
ribbons  ;  but  he  is  a  man  who  might  pass  unnoticed 
amongst  his  fellows.  Yet  at  a  word  from  him 
200,000  tons  of  steel  is  galvanized  into  life,  huge 
screws  churn  the  water,  and  the  bow  waves  of  many 
ships  froth  up  to  the  hawse-pipes  as  "  The  Fleet  " 
puts  to  sea.  He  gives  the  word,  and  the  spider-web 
wires  catch  the  distant  spark  and  sputter  of  his 
signals.  He  is  the  brain  of  the  Fleet,  and  the  nerves 
of  steel  transmit  his  desire  for  action  to  this  city  upon 
the  waters. 

It  oppresses,  as  a  dream  oppresses,  and  the  im- 
mensity of  it  all  is  too  great  to  grasp  at  a  moment's 
notice. 

A  brisk  destroyer  glides  down  the  Channel  like  the 
pilot  fish  to  some  huge  shark  following  behind,  and 
a  cruiser  in  all  her  pompous  might,  ominous,  threaten- 
ing, crowds  close  on  her  heels.  She  is  grey  from 
masthead  to  water-line,  and  her  monotony  of  tone  is 
accentuated  by  the  gaily  coloured  string  of  bunting 
that  flutters  upon  her  signal  halyards.  As  she 
passes,  a  flash  of  light  from  the  bridge  winks  through 


THE  BATTLE  CRUISERS  245 

the  thinner  mists  as  a  searchlight  stutters  out  a 
message  to  the  smaller  fry.  Forward,  amidships, 
and  aft,  great  guns  in  pairs  explain  the  reason  of  her 
being.  In  the  old  sense  of  the  word  this  is  no  ship  : 
rather  a  floating  platform  for  huge  weapons  that 
throw  2,000  Ib.  of  steel  for  ten  or  fifteen  miles  when 
one  man  tightens  his  finger  on  the  brass  pistol  grip 
in  her  turrets. 

,  Sheer  sides,  flat  decks  shorn  of  projections,  and 
guns,  always  guns,  are  her  outstanding  features.  It 
seems  ridiculous  to  think  that  she  floats  at  all,  this 
great  dead  weight  of  metal.  A  bugle  rings  out 
short  and  sharp,  and  bare  feet  patter  on  steel  ladders 
and  wooden  decks.  Her  hatches  and  companions 
vomit  men.  A  wailing  whistle,  the  seemingly 
ineffective  pipe  of  the  boatswain,  conveys  more  than 
words.  Six  hundred  men  have  been  told  in  six 
unmusical  notes  what  is  wanted  of  them. 

Up  on  the  bridge  the  midshipman  of  the  watch  is 
filling  in  time  talking  to  a  friend  about  his  last  dance 
on  shore.  The  decorous  arms  of  the  semaphore 
spell  out  the  details  of  a  scene  laid  in  a  conservatory 
in  which  figure  a  midshipman,  a  peche  Melba,  and  a 
girl.  The  yeoman  of  signals  is  writing  near  the 
telegraph,  and  the  squeak  of  his  pencil  on  the  slate 
seems  incongruous. 

Far  below  a  lieutenant  mounts  a  bar-runged  ladder 
to  the  top  of  "  Q  "  turret  and  disappears  through  the 
steel  canopy.  Three  men  follow  him.  Inside  there 
is  the  roar  and  rattle  of  moving  machinery.  The  eye 
fails  again.  Levers,  wheels,  voice-tubes,  and  dials 


246        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

fill  all  the  wall  space  and  much  of  the  interior.  The 
lieutenant  bends  down  and  turns  a  wheel.  From  a 
pit  below  comes  the  clang  of  metal  on  metal,  and  a 
massive  lift  tosses  a  shell  62  inches  long  towards  the 
breech  of  the  port  gun,  a  thing  of  steel  and  brass 
5  feet  through.  The  breech  opens  with  a  half  turn, 
and  then  one  realizes  that  the  devil  must  be  in  this 
machinery.  With  a  rush,  a  chain  rammer  roars  up 
from  its  vertical  position  behind  the  gun.  It  is  like 
the  chain  of  a  bicycle,  only  its  links  are  6  inches 
through  and  are  made  to  bend  only  one  way,  like  a 
man's  fir^gers.  From  the  perpendicular  it  runs  along 
horizontally,  propelling  the  mighty  projectile  into 
the  gaping  maw  of  the  waiting  gun. 

The  process  is  repeated,  but  this  time  the  rammer 
pushes  in  behind  the  'shell  the  two  great  silk  bags  of 
cordite  which  send  the  ton  of  steel  on  its  way.  The 
last  is  sent  home,  the  breech  swings  on  its  hinge  and 
slowly  turns,  locking  with  the  turning.  A  man 
approaches  with  a  metal  tube,  not  a  span  long,  and 
inserts  it  in  the  breech  centre.  All  is  quiet  again 
save  for  the  noise  of  the  hydraulic  machinery  and 
the  overflow  of  the  orders  shouted  into  the  copper- 
mouthed  voice-tubes.  There  is  a  terrifying  roar, 
none  the  less  fearful  for  the  fact  that  it  is  sustained 
and  muffled,  and  the  huge  gun  darts  back  with  the 
recoil  of  the  explosion.  More  slowly  still  it  resumes 
its  normal  position,  and  almost  before  it  has  stopped 
its  forward  motion  there  is  another  shell  waiting  for 
the  breech  to  open.  And  that  is  war — from  one  end. 
At  the  other  there  are  the  gaping  decks,  the  blood- 


THE  BATTLE  CRUISERS  247 

stained  floors  and  walls,  the  inrush  of  water,  and  the 
death  cries  of  men  made  in  the  Creator's  image. 

Above  the  voice  of  the  range-taker  calls  the 
ranges.  "  Ten  eight  hundred,  ten  eight-fifty,  ten 
nine  hundred,"  he  calls  monotonously,  and  one 
realizes  that  miles  away  is  an  enemy  for  which  are 
destined  these  bolts  of  fire. 

It  is  not  always  that  these  great  ships  steam  self- 
confident  down  the  Channel.  Sometimes  they  come 
limping  back  to  port,  decks  aslant  and  scarred, 
and  then  it  is  that  the  great  dock  caissons  are  opened 
and  they  go  to  sick  bay.  Ten  years  ago  the  plover 
and  the  tern  circled  above  the  low,  flat  bailks  of  this 
great  northern  river.  Where  once  was  heard  only 
the  cry  of  the  waterfowl  there  is  now  a  mighty  naval 
dockyard.  Men  have  delved  huge  pits  in  the  black 
mud  and  lined  them  with  stone  and  mortar.  Chang- 
ing banks  have  been  stayed  and  shored  with  granite, 
and  the  insane  chatter  of  the  pneumatic  riveters  has 
driven  the  whaup  to  the  lowland  moss  hags.  A 
huge  steel  door  slowly  swings  open  to  admit  a  ship 
that  has  "  gone  sick."  With  infinite  patience  and 
care  she  is  warped  into  her  place,  her  stem  pointing 
to  the  exact  centre  of  the  far  wall  of  the  dock. 
By  evening,  propped  and  shored,  she  is  revealed  in 
all  her  immensity,  her  swelling  hull,  her  great 
screws,  the  overhanging  flare  of  her  bows  giving  one 
the  idea  of  force  and  speed.  Far  below  in  the  dock 
bottom  pygmies  with  sledge-hammers  shore  up  the, 
keel  blocks  with  wedges.  In  this  huge  pit  the 
Archbishop  of  York  addressed  80,000  sailors,  and 


248         LIGHT  AND   SHADE   IN   WAR 

they  seemed  to  occupy  but  a  small  portion  of  the 
space.  Giant  props  from  hull  to  dock-sill  take  her 
weight,  and  in  the  great  machine  shops  men  are 
slaving  under  acres  of  glass  roof,  cutting,  bending, 
and  drilling  the  plates. 

Thousands  of  men  are  working  round  these  docks. 
There  seems  no  particular  control.  Looking  for  a 
foreman  one  is  perplexed  to  find  that  there  is 
apparently  no  one  in  authority.  In  reality  there 
is  the  closest  supervision,  and  not  a  rivet  is  ham- 
mered in  but  what  the  work  is  checked  and  tested. 

A  short,  heavily-built  figure  walks  briskly  along 
the  caisson  top.  His  hair  is  grey,  but  his  stride  is 
young.  He  typifies  energy,  and  his  voice  is  one  of 
those  voices  which  were  made  for  the  time  of  Peter 
Simple.  It  rings  clear  above  the  din  of  machinery  as 
it  would  above  the  noise  of  a  thirty-knot  gale.  It  is 
a  voice  that  is  meant  to  give  orders  above  the  crack 
of  bellying  sails  and  the  snap  of  halyards  on  yards 
and  masts.  This  is  the  man  for  whom  all  this 
machinery  starts  its  agitated  chatter.  It  is  at  his 
bidding  that  the  men  swinging  the  heavy  hammers  in 
the  dock  are  sweating,  and  when  one  sees  him  one 
scarcely  wonders  at  the  prodigious  activity  of  it  all. 
This  man  is  a  surgeon  of  metal,  a  dispenser  for  all 
the  ills  a  ship  is  heir  to.  They  come  to  him  halt 
and  maimed  and  go  away  cured. 

As  with  the  Fleet  the  vastness  of  it  all  finds  one 
at  a  loss.  Roget's  Thesaurus  has  not  synonyms 
enough  to  express  its  bigness  or  the  infinite  variety 
of  its  detail.  There  are  machines  that  gibber  at 


THE  BATTLE  CRUISERS  249 

you  as  they  chip  away  bronze  and  iron  as  a  wood- 
carver  would  cut  kauri  pine.  There  is  one  that 
chews  steel  plate  and  spits  the  fragments  at  your 
feet ;  another  that  cuts  clean  holes  through  half- 
inch  steel  as  an  office  punch  cuts  papers  for  filing. 
A  saw-toothed  ribbon  of  steel  bites  deep  into  a 
half-foot  rod  with  the  ease  of  a  boy's  fretsaw  cutting 
cedar.  And  the  men  working  all  these  things  talk 
to  each  other  and  carry  on  a  conversation  amidst  a 
maniacal  clatter  that  beats  on  the  ear-drums  like  a 
masseur's  vibrator. 

Not  all  the  work  is  done  above  in  the  sun's  light. 
By  the  entrance  to  a  great  dock  two  men  turn 
unceasingly  at  the  wheels  on  either  side  of  a  brass- 
bound  box  from  which  a  pipe  leads  into  the  water. 
Twenty  feet  from  the  boat  in  which  this  air  pump 
is  being  worked  the  water  is  constantly  disturbed  by 
streams  of  bursting  bubbles.  A  diver  is  below 
removing  debris  that  is  blocking  the  caisson,  the  dock 
door.  Presently  he  emerges,  heavily  lifting  his  40 
Ib.  leaden-soled  boots  from  the  water.  Again  it  is 
the  Navy  at  work,  ubiquitous  "  Jacks  of  all  trades," 
but  masters  of  them  all.  Specialization  is  the 
essence  of  this  ubiquity,  but  it  is  not  carried  too  far, 
and  the  man  who  takes  down  the  engine  of  the 
steam  pinnace  to-day  may  be  sending  2,000  Ib.  of 
metal  towards  the  War  Lord's  Fleet  to-morrow. 
"  All  cats  catch  mice  on  these  ships,"  says  the 
Admiral.  In  action  the  padre,  his  clergyman's 
collar  contrasting  strangely  with  the  war  machinery 
at  his  hand,  gives  out  the  ranges,  and  his  voice  does 


250        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

not  change.  But  for  the  fact  that  there  are  no 
hymns  numbered  "  ten  eight  hundred  "  he  might  be 
thumbing  the  leaves  of  Ancient  and  Modern. 

And  so  we  leave  this  harbour  of  Mars,  but  we  go 
away  in  a  different  frame  of  mind  from  that  in 
which  we  came.  When  we  wax  patriotic  and 
musical  we  sing  that  Britannia  rules  the  waves.  It 
may  be  cheap  sentiment,  but  patriotism  is  like  golf, 
the  man  who  is  playing  the  game  can  boast  about  it 
without  bad  taste.  Over  all  is  the  idea  that  this  is 
but  the  flying  squadron  of  the  great  Armada  of 
Britain.  We  may  not  rule  the  waves  as  yet,  but  our 
glass  is  rising,  and  when  the  pointer  shows  "  stormy  " 
we  may  rest  assured  that  to  us,  at  any  rate,  no  harm 
will  come  as  long  as  the  morning  mists  rise  above 
this  great  grey  Fleet. 


BUILDING  THE  WARSHIPS 

IT  is  the  Glorious  First  of  June.  One  hundred 
and  twenty-two  years  ago  to-day  the  English 
Fleet  under  Lord  Howe  cleared  its  decks  for  action. 
Gun  ports  were  opened,  powder  was  brought  up  from 
below,  and  the  gunners,  stripped  to  the  waist,  passed 
the  round  shot  from  hand  to  hand,  from  lazarette  to 
the  batteries.  The  day  ended  with  victory. 

To-day,  nearly  a  century  and  a  quarter  after- 
wards, England  is  fighting  side  by  side  with  her  foe 
of  the  First  of  June.  The  decks  of  her  ships  are 
again  cleared  for  action,  but  they  are  different  ships 
these.  The  walls  of  oak  are  gone.  We  now  have 
walls  of  steel. 

Have  you  ever  lain  awake  in  your  bunk  in  a 
steamer  and  thought  of  all  the  work  that  must  go  to 
the  building  of  such  a  vessel  ?  You  listen  to  the 
throb  of  the  screws,  the  squeaking  of  the  hull  as  it 
takes  the  strain  of  the  heavy  seas,  the  steady  rhyth- 
mic beat  of  the  engines.  Above  your  bed  the  steel 
plates  are  neatly  riveted,  and  you  wonder  who  it  is 
that  puts  the  ship  together  and  unites  all  the  multitu- 
dinous parts  that  form  its  entity.  It  is  easy  for  the 

251 


252        LIGHT  AND   SHADE  IN  WAR 

layman  to  think  out  the  making  of  each  separate 
particle  of  such  a  construction,  but  it  is  the  combining 
of  them  that  seems  almost  beyond  the  power  of 
mortal  man.  I  have  seen  on  the  Tyne  and  the  Clyde 
the  men  who  do  these  things  and  more  :  the  men 
who  build  and  equip  the  fleets  of  Britain.  The 
merchantman  is  a  work  of  months,  and  the  brains 
of  many  men  go  to  her  making,  but  the  battleship 
is  as  different  from  the  tramp  as  is  an  alarm  clock 
from  a  ship's  chronometer.  The  man  who  builds  a 
battleship  has  to  build  a  hull  that  has  to  stand  not 
only  the  strains  of  the  seas,  but  the  titanic  forces  of 
the  great  guns,  and  the  energy  of  engines  equal  to 
the  horse-power  of  a  fleet  of  tramps. 

By  the  river  bank  is  a  towering  mass  of  steel  and 
iron.  It  is  almost,  not  quite,  a  battleship.  She 
has  been  launched  from  the  ways  about  a  month, 
and  now  a  hive  of  workmen  swarm  about  her  tall 
sides  and  buzz  and  clatter  in  the  great  hull.  She  is 
the  embodiment  of  all  that  man  has  put  into  this 
business  of  killing  his  fellows  that  he  has  taken  up  so 
seriously  of  late  years.  The  bows,  as  sharp  as  a 
knife,  curve  upwards  until  one  would  almost  think 
that  she  must  topple  over.  She  looks  as  if  she  was 
made  to  cut  the  seas  and  spurn  them  past  her  sides, 
and  in  reality  that  is  what  she  will  do.  Her  decks  are 
iron,  for  all  wood  planking  has  long  ago  been  dis- 
carded. A  shell  landing  on  wooden  decks  would 
start  fires,  and  for  this  reason  these  new  decks  are  of 
steel. 

Looking  from  the  bridge  to  the  bows  one  is  im- 


BUILDING  THE  WARSHIPS  253 

pressed  with  the  enormous  length  of  these  ships. 
From  her  gun  turrets  to  the  flagstaff  on  her  bows 
there  is  nothing  to  take  away  from  this  effect.  Not 
a  winch  or  a  fan  intake  breaks  the  clear  space.  To 
the  outsider  this  seems  the  embryo  stage  of  a  ship. 
It  is  not.  We  have  seen  the  real  beginning  of  a 
warship.  She  begins  her  being  on  paper,  and  from 
the  paper  plans  are  made  wooden  models  of  her 
many  parts.  Then  one  sees  the  vessel  in  molten 
form  as  the  glowing  crucibles  spill  the  running  metal 
into  the  moulds.  At  this  stage  turbine  castings, 
gear  wheels,  and  bed  plates  begin  to  take  some  sort 
of  shape,  and  from  now  onward  they  never  vary 
much.  They  come  from  the  moulds  rough  castings 
and  go  through  many  stages  before  they  are  assem- 
bled, but  each  unit  has  now  its  final  shape.  A  wood- 
worker's shop  is  in  some  respects  not  much  different 
from  these  huge  foundries  and  metal  mills.  There 
are  planing  machines,  drills,  punching  machines,  and 
saws,  all  counterparts  of  those  used  by  the  joiner, 
with  the  difference  that  for  metal-working  they  are 
all  built  with  one  idea,  the  idea  of  strength,  and  they 
are  in  all  cases  many  times  larger  than  their  proto- 
types of  the  joinery. 

These  are  the  beginnings  of  a  ship.  The  clumsy 
hull  on  the  river  side  is  really  the  last  stage  but  one. 
It  is  finished  as  to  its  shell,  and  now  waits  for  its 
furnishings  of  guns  and  engines.  The  sheer  sides  are 
red  with  paint,  put  on,  surely,  by  some  post- 
impressionist,  and  the  steel  plates  still  bear  the  chalk 
marks  of  the  man  who  fitted  all  this  conglomeration 


254        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

of  metals  together.  In  the  shops  a  man  chalks 
mystic  hieroglyphics  on  a  steel  plate,  and  with  that 
writing  the  plate  becomes  part  of  a  ship.  Where 
you  now  see  a  few  letters  and  numbers,  you  know 
that  in  a  week  or  so  there  will  be  a  gun-mounting,  a 
range-finder,  or  a  fire  hydrant.  I  envied  that  man 
with  the  chalk.  It  must  be  satisfying  to  walk  over 
these  huge  hulls  and  with  a  movement  of  the  fingers 
decide  where  even  a  ring-bolt  must  go. 

The  spectator  looking  at  this  prodigious  activity 
would  think  that  all  the  industry  of  the  river  must  be 
centred  here,  but  he  would  be  very  wrong.  For 
nineteen  miles  the  waterway  is  given  over  to  the 
forge  and  the  workshop.  Steaming  up  the  river  one 
goes  through  a  lane  of  giant  slipways  and  huge 
scaffoldings.  Spidery  cranes  tower  above  the  roofs, 
or  run  backwards  and  forwards  on  overhead  railways. 
It  is  an  astonishing  thing  about  the  really  big  crane, 
that  the  greater  the  weight  that  it  can  lift,  the  more 
topheavy  and  unsubstantial  it  looks.  One  sees  loads 
of  200  tons  being  transported  the  length  of  a  ship- 
yard on  a  wire,  so  thin  that  it  is  almost  invisible  from 
a  little  way  off,  suspended  from  a  trellis  work  of  steel 
that  seems  as  if  it  would  collapse  if  a  high  wind 
caught  it.  At  one  of  these  yards  is  a  crane  that  will 
lift  an  express  locomotive  from  the  Tyne  high-level 
bridge  !  For  nineteen  miles  this  waterway  is 
dedicated  to  Vulcan.  On  either  bank  the  hulls  of 
ships  of  war  are  building,  and  above  hangs  the 
smoke  pall  from  the  countless  furnaces. 

Two  years  ago  this  river  was  the  centre  of  the 


BUILDING  THE  WARSHIPS  255 

great  shipbuilding  industry,  but  it  was  war  that 
made  it  as  it  is  now.  On  some  of  the  stocks  there 
are  hulls  begun  in  1914.  They  are  still  unfinished, 
for  they  are  merchantmen,  and  take  a  second  place 
to  the  ships  of  His  Majesty's  Navy.  Not  all  the 
vessels  building  are  vessels  of  war,  however.  Cheek 
by  jowl  with  a  pair  of  destroyers  is  a  ship  of  a  class 
unknown  in  British  waters.  It  is  an  ice-breaker  for 
our  Ally  Russia,  and  as  it  stands  with  its  ribs  ex- 
posed, a  skeleton  of  a  ship,  one  can  get  some  idea  of 
its  enormous  strength.  Its  ribs  are  twice  as  thick 
as  those  of  an  ordinary  vessel,  and  under  the  bows 
there  is  a  giant  propeller  that  will  cut  the  thick 
pack  ice  as  a  carpenter's  auger  cuts  soft  wood.  With 
this  the  vessel  will  literally  plough  through  the  white 
seas  where  no  other  class  of  ship  could  venture. 

Every  conceivable  type  of  craft  is  on  the  stocks 
here.  There  are  submarines  that  make  Jules  Verne's 
Nautilus  look  like  a  toy  boat  on  the  Kensington 
Round  Pond.  This  war  has  seen  the  usefulness  of 
the  small  craft,  and  in  consequence  they  are  building 
everywhere.  Every  yard  is  building  destroyers,  and 
they  do  not  take  long  to  build.  In  one  yard  there  is 
a  skeleton  of  a  ship  that  will  be  sailing  what  some 
maps  still  call  the  German  Ocean  in  less  than  two 
months.  The  work  goes  on  always,  and  never  for 
a  minute  does  the  din  and  clatter  cease.  As  dark- 
ness falls  flares  are  lit,  and  dawn  sees  tired  men  still 
bearing  their  weight  on  drills  and  riveters  after  hours 
of  heavy  labour. 

Farther  up  the  river  is  a  yard  where  shells  are 


256        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

made  as  well  as  ships.  Before  the  war  this  firm 
employed  1,200  men  at  this  work,  now  they  have 
25,000  men  and  girls  on  their  pay-rolls.  Besides 
the  men  workers  there  are  13,000  girls  in  the  shops, 
controlling  automatic  and  semi-automatic  shell- 
making  machinery. 

The  shops  themselves  are  airy  and  well  lighted 
where  the  women  work,  but  no  amount  of  ventila- 
tion would  make  some  of  the  bays  comfortable  for 
a  layman.  With  astonishing  persistence  the  British 
workman  works  in  temperatures  that  put  the  Sahara 
in  the  shade,  and  he  never  doffs  a  garment.  Men 
dressed  in  full  suits,  with  a  sweater  and  extra  waist- 
coat to  boot,  swing  giant  cauldrons  of  molten  metal 
about  as  if  they  were  cold  and  were  trying  to  restore 
their  circulation.  Here  is  the  shop  where  the  15- 
inch  shells  are  made.  In  one  corner  a  blast  furnace 
heats  the  great  steel  ingots  and  spits  them  forth 
when  they  reach  a  proper  temperature. 

Two  sweating  devils,  armed  with  giant  pincers, 
bear  down  on  the  red-hot  mass  and  affix  chains  to  it. 
There  is  a  roar  from  overhead  as  the  travelling  crane 
gets  under  way  and  the  ponderous  ingot  is  swung 
away  through  the  air,  leaving  a  trail  of  sparks  in  its 
wake  like  some  leisurely  meteor.  Two  more  devils 
with  tongs  seize  it  and  slide  it  up-ended  into  a 
cylindrical  slot.  A  wheel  is  turned  and  a  great 
punch  comes  steadily  down  into  the  soft  metal  mass, 
pushing  its  way  into  it  as  though  it  were  soft  dough. 
Now  the  ingot  is  beginning  to  take  shape  ;  it  is 
getting  more  like  the  conventional  shell.  It  is  like 


BUILDING  THE  WARSHIPS  257 

an  elongated  thimble  as  it  swings  away  to  the  draw- 
ing machine.  Here,  as  the  name  of  the  operation 
implies,  the  shell  is  stretched  until  it  is  over  5  feet 
in  length.  It  is  again  punched  before  it  is  allowed  to 
leave  the  shop  for  the  place  where  it  is  put  on  a  lathe. 
Here  the  dull  oxydized  outer  skin  is  peeled  off  in 
much  the  same  way  as  an  apple-peeler  takes  the  skin 
from  an  apple.  There  is  a  man  to  look  after  this 
lathe,  but  his  presence  seems  superfluous.  The 
lathe  has  long  ago  made  up  its  mind  how  much 
metal  is  to  come  off  this  particular  shell,  and  when 
it  thinks  it  has  done  enough  it  stops  with  a  satisfied 
grunt.  All  the  time  the  cutting  is  going  on  a  jet  of 
water  is  playing  on  the  cutting  tool,  and  so  hot  does 
this  get  that  the  water  seethes  and  bubbles  as  it 
touches  it.  These  shells  weigh  14  Ib.  short  of  the 
2,000  when  they  are  finished.  This  is  no  secret,  for 
our  enemies  have  felt  the  weight  of  some  of  them  ! 
Out  of  every  batch  of  ten,  one  is  cut  for  testing 
purposes.  Some  of  the  tools  for  the  boring  and 
"  lining  "  of  these  larger  projectiles  weigh  24  tons. 

On  another  floor  the  weapons  that  are  destined  to 
hurl  these  missiles  are  made.  One  is  confronted 
with  a  hopeless  nightmare  of  figures  and  calculations, 
but  one  fact  is  worth  noting.  The  modern  big  gun 
is  made  with  a  core  of  solid  steel  around  which  is 
wound  steel  wire.  On  the  biggest  guns  in  use  now 
there  are  between  140  and  170  miles  of  this  wire  f 

Now  all  you  people  who  have  not  seen  these  things 
take  warning  and  remember  yourself  in  time  when 
you  are  next  tempted  to  say,  "  What  are  we  doing 

s 


258        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

in  the  way  of  building  ships  ?  Why  haven't  we  got 
submarines  and  other  craft  like  the  Germans  ?  " 
Such  doubtings  are  worse  than  heresy.  They  are 
rank  injustice,  for  up  there  in  the  North  there  are 
men  who  are  giving  you  their  very  life-blood  that 
you  should  be  free.  There  is  one  firm  there  that 
has  given  the  Government  engines  representing 
1,000  indicated  horse-power  per  day  since  the 
beginning  of  the  year.  To  do  that  the  men  with  the 
brains  had  to  work  long  into  the  nights,  the  men 
who  used  their  hands  had  to  sweat  and  toil  for  long 
shifts,  but  they  have  achieved  their  object,  and  will 
be  able  to  say  to  themselves,  "  We  have  done  our 
best." 


THE  GRIST  HOUSE 

[With   acknowledgments  jor  suggestions   received   at 
The  Gift  House,  48  Pall  Mall.] 

EVELYN  has  got  some  steady  congenial  work 
at  last.  She  is  helping  at  the  Grist  House, 
where  they  receive  and  sell  gifts  for  the  benefit 
of  a  great  and  deserving  charity.  She  is  engaged  in 
selling  other  people's  property  at  prices  that  draw 
even  the  dealers.  In  the  Grist  House  you  can  buy 
anything  from  a  Great  Dane  dog  to  a  lock  of  hair 
from  the  head  of  Marie  Antoinette's  maid-in-waiting. 
All  these  things  are  given,  or  one  might  almost 
say  extorted,  from  citizens  who  have  spent  long 
years  in  collecting.  Evelyn  has  taken  her  degree 
in  the  art  of  extortion.  She  goes  to  a  friend's 
house  to  dinner  in  London,  or  in  the  country  for  a 
week-end,  and  comes  away  with  perhaps  a  hundred 
pounds'  worth  of  pictures,  plate,  postage  stamps, 
pottery,  old  prints.  She  takes  these  to  the  Grist 
House  and  tickets  them.  Every  time  she  is  asked 
out  she  brings  grist  to  the  Grist  House  ;  so  beware. 
The  men  and  women  who  hand  over  these  things 
in  their  generous  after-dinner  moods  often  relent 
when  they  come  down  to  breakfast  and  look  the 

259 


260        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

matter  over  in  the  light  of  day.  Then  they  come 
to  the  Grist  House  and  buy  them  back.  They 
come  up  from  their  country  houses  disguised  and 
wearing  false  whiskers  and  false  sang-froid.  At  the 
end  of  the  street  they  remove  the  former,  and 
the  latter  falls  from  them  automatically.  If  they 
are  lucky  they  strike  a  day  when  Evelyn  is  not  on 
duty  and  they  are  able  to  buy  back  their  treasures 
at  a  rate  that  would  seem  impossible  if  they  had 
time  to  think  about  it  at  all.  If  she  is  there,  they 
come  in  with  an  air  of  charity,  and  end  up  by  buying 
a  great  many  things  that  they  have  no  use  for. 
This  is  the  essence  of  the  business.  It  is  a  great 
thing  to  consolidate  the  supply  and  demand  in  one 
person.  If  you  can  persuade  a  man  to  give  a  piece 
of  tapestry  worth  £200  and  buy  it  back  at  double 
that  price,  you  are  exactly  £400  to  the  good. 

I  went  into  the  Grist  House  the  other  day  and 
found  Evelyn  attired  in  a  holland  overall  and  a 
disarming  smile.  She  started  on  me  before  I  had 
decided  whether  to  take  off  my  hat  or  remain 
covered.  She  tried  to  sell  me  a  donkey,  a  Murillo, 
a  Spanish  scarf,  a  Roman  coin,  an  autograph 
letter  of  Louis  XV  and  a  pair  of  boots  worn  by 
George  R.  Sims  at  the  coronation  of  Queen  Anne. 
I  feigned  deafness. 

Then  a  man  came  in  who  was  obviously  a  pur- 
chaser. He  sauntered  down  the  length  of  the 
room  and  looked  all  about  him.  Evelyn  was  on 
to  him  like  a  seagull  on  to  a  piece  of  fish.  "  Have 
you  seen  this  old  glass  ?  "  she  asked,  and  dragged 


THE   GRIST  HOUSE  261 

him  across  the  floor.  He  did  not  seem  interested 
in  old  glass  and  tried  to  tell  her  so,  but  she  was  in 
no  mood  to  listen.  "  This  carpet  is  beautiful, 
isn't  it  ?  "  she  purred  as  she  turned  over  a  many- 
coloured  rug.  Still  nothing  doing.  Then  she  tried 
him  with  a  sauce-boat,  a  Castilian  wedding  canopy, 
a  meerschaum  pipe  and  a  pair  of  jet  earrings.  All 
this  time  he  was  trying  to  speak,  but  he  had  as  much 
chance  of  getting  out  three  syllables  as  a  Democratic 
candidate  at  a  Republican  meeting  in  Lame  Dog 
City,  Cal.  At  last  Evelyn  stopped  and  the  man 
got  a  word  or  two  in  thin  wise.  "I've  come  about 
the  electric  light,"  he  said. 

Presently  she  did  get  a  real  purchaser.  He  had 
picked  up  a  Dresden  group.  "  That  is  most  inter- 
esting," said  Evelyn  impressively  ;  "  it  is  an  ancient 
piece  of  Ming  chinaware,  about  three  hundred 
years  before  Yuan  Shi  Kai.  Its  price  is  only  thirty 
guineas.  Shall  I  wrap  it  up  for  you  ?  "  "I'm 
afraid  not,"  said  the  man.  '  You  see  I  presented 
it  myself  last  week.  I  didn't  know  it  was  Chinese, 
though,"  he  said  pleasantly.  Again  Evelyn  was 
stumped. 

They  have  got  to  such  a  state  of  perfection  in  the 
Grist  House  that  they  can  tell  what  a  man's  income 
is  to  ten  pounds  before  he  has  been  in  a  minute. 
If  the  visitor  is  really  well  off  and  runs  into  five 
figures  per  annum  the  whole  staff  of  lady-helpers 
rises  as  one  woman  and  hems  him  in.  For  every 
thousand  you  come  down  one  less  assistant  gets  up. 
When  I  go  in  there  is  never  a  move,  and  that  is  as 


262        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

it  should  be.  Two  days  ago  a  man  came  in  wearing 
an  anxious  look  and  a  Harris  tweed  suit.  He 
looked  a  three-figure  man  at  the  most,  and  Evelyn 
got  up  from  her  seat  and  then  sat  down  again 
languidly.  The  man  glanced  round  the  various 
exhibits,  and  at  last  looked  rather  inquiringly  at 
Evelyn.  She  dropped  her  book  and  her  blase  look 
and  said  sweetly,  "  Have  you  come  to  look  round  ?  " 
The  man  said  he  had,  and  asked  the  price  of  a 
diamond  necklace.  He  was  told  it  was  two  hundred 
and  fifty  pounds,  and  Evelyn  and  I  watched  to  see 
him  faint.  Instead  he  drew  out  his  cheque-book 
and  said,  "  Who  shall  I  make  out  the  cheque  to  ?  " 

In  five  minutes  he  had  the  whole  staff  round  him. 
In  five  more  he  had  bought  an  Irish  terrier,  some 
Irish  lace  and  an  Irish  glass  dessert-bowl.  Then  he 
was  shown  a  fly-whisk,  a  Maori  axe,  an  amethyst 
intaglio,  and  a  Rembrandt.  He  signed  cheques 
for  all  these.  Then  Evelyn  tried  to  sell  him  his  own 
walking-stick,  which  he  had  put  down  in  a  corner. 
When  he  left  finally  he  had  come  to  the  last  cheque 
in  his  book,  and  the  floor  was  littered  with  his 
purchases. 

Then  every  now  and  then  there  are  quite  imma- 
culately dressed  men  who  stroll  in  and  pick  up  the 
different  articles  and  put  them  down  again  without 
a  word.  They  are  obviously  dealers  in  these  things, 
and  they  wear  the  air  of  a  Sergeant  of  Grenadiers 
escorting  a  batch  of  "  Group  49*5  "  past  Wellington 
Barracks.  Sometimes  they  see  something  that 
pleases  them  and  they  allow  a  little  animation  to 


THE  GRIST  HOUSE  263 

creep  into  their  sad  faces.  Then  they  take  out 
magnifying  glasses  and  gaze  long  and  intently  at 
hall-marks  and  initials.  Sometimes  they  sign 
cheques,  too ;  but  when  they  do  the  Grist  House 
people  know  that  the  sale  is  not  one  to  be  proud  of. 
One  of  the  greatest  works  of  the  War  is  being 
carried  on  at  the  Grist  House,  and  I  have  yet  to 
meet  a  man  who  was  not  satisfied  with  a  purchase 
made  there.  Its  chief  merit  to  me  is  that  it  keeps 
Evelyn  busy,  and  now  she  need  not  cut  her  hair  and 
her  skirts  short  and  don  khaki  and  a  Sam  Browne 
belt.  Evelyn  always  does  things  thoroughly,  and 
I  am  pleased  to  say  that  she  is  just  now  going  through 
her  visiting  list,  putting  a  mark  against  all  those 
people  who  have  still  got  some  old  china  or  prized 
antiques  hidden  away.  If  she  has  her  way  all  her 
friends  will  have  exchanged  their  collections  amongst 
themselves  before  the  War  finishes.  Perhaps,  when 
peace  is  declared,  they  will  be  able  to  sort  them  out 
again. 


PLAYING  THE  BYE 

THE  Ayshire  coast  curves  gently,  edged  with 
white  green-topped  sand  dunes.  Over  the 
water,  Arran,  veiled  in  mist,  lies  like  some  fairy  isle, 
fading  from  view  and  reappearing  as  the  winds  of 
the  sea  sweep  round  the  channel  of  Bute  Sound  and 
curl  about  Pladda. 

On  the  mainland  of  Ayr  a  rampart  of  sand  keeps 
the  sea  from  the  links  and  protects  the  greens  from 
the  salt  spray.  This  is  such  a  course  as  the  best 
golfers  love,  but  it  is  strangely  deserted  to-day.  A 
gull  stands  on  the  first  tee  undisturbed.  No  one 
calls  "  Fore,"  even  the  caddy-house  is  silent.  There 
are  occasional  sounds  from  the  club-maker's  work- 
shop, however,  and  as  I  peer  into  the  shadowy  room 
from  the  bright  sunlight  I  see  a  very  old  man  bending 
over  his  work.  ' '  My  hands  is  a  wee  bit  stiff  whiles, ' ' 
he  mutters  half  apologetically,  "  but  I'll  do  it  wi'  the 
best  o'  them  again."  And  then,  bit  by  bit,  he  tells 
why  it  is  that  he  has  left  the  warm  chimney-corner 
and  come  back  here  to  do  work  that  he  has  not  done 
for  fifteen  years. 

His  son  was  the  professional  club-maker  here,  and 
when  the  war  came  he  had  laid  aside  the  spokeshave 
and  the  rasp  and  donned  the  kilt  and  the  khaki 

265 


266       -LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

tunic.  I  asked  what  regiment  he  had  joined.  The 
old  man's  answer  was  typical.  "  The  Argylls,"  he 
said,  "  and  what  else,  him  bein'  a  Campbell  ?  He 
was  trainin'  doon  in  England  for  six  months,  and 
then  he  went  tae  France  for  the  battle  o'  Loos.  He 
was  a  sergeant,  he  was,  and  he  led  his  men  when  his 
officer  was  killed.  It  was  about  the  evening  when 
they  brought  him  in,  and  there  was  no'  much  left  o' 
him,  for  a  bit  o'  a  shell  had  got  him  in  the  chest.  He 
died  there,  and  I  had  word  from  his  major  a  fortnight 
since.  He's  comin'  this  forenoon  to  tell  me  the  way 
he  died.  And  maybe  you'd  like  to  stay  and  hear, 
too,  for  Jamie  liked  you  fine,  and  he  used  to  tell  me 
that  you  were  a  fine  one  wi'  the  driver,  but  awfu' 
weak  on  the  short  game." 

Presently  the  Major  came.  There  are  some  men 
to  whom  other  men  take  an  instinctive  liking  at  first 
sight.  Here  was  one  of  them.  He  was  tall,  but 
broad,  with  eyes  clear  and  blue,  and  thick,  close 
hair  that  curled  under  the  edge  of  his  Glengarry. 
He  shook  hands  with  the  old  man  silently,  and 
looked  inquiringly  at  me.  I  rose  to  go,  but  old 
Andrew  stopped  me.  "  He  knew  Jamie  "  was  all  he 
said. 

Then  the  Major  told  the  story  of  the  hopelessness 
of  an  attack  that  overreached  itself.  Now  and 
again  he  spoke,  as  if  inspired,  of  the  great  heroism 
of  his  men.  "  I  saw  Jamie  afterwards,  just  before 
he  went.  He  was  cheery,  and  not  in  pain,  and  he 
asked  me  to  tell  you  he  was  happy  that  he  had  saved 
for  you  and  you  would  not  want  for  anything.  Just 


PLAYING  THE  BYE  267 

before  he  died,  when  his  breath  came  hardly,  he 
said  :  '  Tell  father  I'm  going  from  the  rough  to  the 
fairway,  and  that  it  was  a  fine  game.'  ' 

The  old  man  laid  his  head  on  the  bench  before  him, 
and  his  silver  hair  mingled  with  the  clean  white 
shavings  from  the  club  shafts,  but  he  said  nothing, 
and  presently  he  straightened  himself  and  his  old 
eyes  kindled.  "  If  they'd  have  me  I'd  be  off  and 
away  now,  but  I  must  just  bide  here  and  keep  up 
Jamie's  wee  bit  business,  e'en  though  he  has  left  us." 

Again  the  knotted  hands  took  up  their  work  for  a 
while,  and  the  Major  signalled  to  me,  and  we  rose  to 
go.  "  I've  got  something  for  ye  here,"  said  old 
Andrew,  and  he  rose  to  fumble  in  a  pile  of  half- 
finished  clubs  in  the  corner  of  the  shop.  "  It  was  a 
club  that  Jamie  was  makin'  fo'  ye  afore  ye  both  left 
here,  but  he  never  finished  it.  I  was  puttin'  on  the 
grip  for  you  last  nicht.  It  was  this  brassie.  No, 
don't  be  thankin'  me,  for  I  did  naething  but  the 
shaft  and  the  grip,  though  I'll  no  be  sayin'  they're 
no  done  well." 

I  saw  the  club  as  he  handed  it  over.  It  was  a 
bonny  head,  but  the  shaft  was  scored  by  bad  work 
and  the  grip  was  lapped  and  folded  as  if  a  child  had 
put  it  on.  The  waxed  threads  that  bound  it  were 
all  overtwisted  and  the  varnish  for  the  thread  had 
run  down  the  leather  and  the  wood  and  botched  it 
sadly.  But  the  old  man  handed  it  to  the  Major  as 
if  it  were  the  most  perfectly  finished  club  in  the 
world,  and  the  Major  took  it  in  the  same  way,  as  if 
it  were  a  king's  gift. 


268        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

As  we  went  over  to  the  club-house,  I  asked  the 
Major  what  he  was  going  to  do  with  his  gift.  "  Of 
course,  you  will  have  to  get  it  re-shafted  ?  "  I  asked, 
with  intention  ;  and  his  answer  was  the  one  that  I 
wanted.  "  It's  worth  my  whole  bag  of  sticks,"  he 
said,  "  and  the  shaft  is  the  best  part  of  it." 


THE  KNEELING  HAMLET 


dignity  and  magnificence  of  a  great  cathe- 
JL  dral  impress  and  enthral,  but  the  simple 
beauty  of  a  country  church  appeals  to  a  deeper 
emotion.  In  time  of  exile  and  anguish,  when  ties 
of  home  and  country  tug  at  our  heart-strings,  it  is 
the  little  village  church  that  one  calls  to  mind  rather 
than  the  great  fane  of  an  abbey  or  the  cloistered 
pile  of  a  cathedral. 

Such  a  church  lingers  in  my  memory.  Its  grey 
shingled  spire  rises  ;  century-old  trees  and  its 
chimes  blend,  when  the  wind  lists,  with  the  crash  of 
the  waves  on  the  Sussex  shore.  It  crests  its  grassy 
rise  and  is  outlined  against  soft  blue  English  skies. 
Around  it  cluster  the  graves  of  generations,  marked 
by  stones  too  age-weary  to  stand  upright,  their 
eloquence  hidden  behind  embroideries  of  green 
moss.  For  600  years  this  little  church  has  stood, 
and  despite  its  grave  sweet  calm  it  has  seen  the 
bloody  tides  of  battle  dash  very  close  to  its  grey 
walls.  Bullet  holes  may  be  seen  in  its  oaken  door, 
relics  of  a  time  when  it  was  a  sanctuary  for  broken 
and  hunted  men.  Well  and  faithfully  has  it  been 

269 


270        LIGHT  AND  SHADE  IN  WAR 

built,  so  well  that  modern  village  tools  are  blunted 
on  its  oak  beams  when  repairs  are  necessary.  Faith 
and  trust,  devotion  and  love,  and  artistic  skill  of  the 
highest  order  have  made  it,  and  time  has  mellowed 
all  its  tints  and  hung  it  with  vivid  emerald.  Down 
the  long  ages  it  has  been  the  setting  of  village  lives, 
christenings,  marriages,  burials.  Now,  after  a  long 
season  of  calm,  the  roar  of  guns  may  be  heard  blend- 
ing with  the  music  of  its  bells.  The  world  is  at 
war,  but  still  Peace  stays  here,  amidst  its  jewelled 
lights  and  dim  shadows.  It  is  a  pax  dolorosa,  but 
of  infinite  consolation. 

On  the  congregation,  as  in  the  world  outside,  the 
war  has  wrought  great  changes.  It  has  awakened 
from  complacent  selfishness  to  a  passionate  patriot- 
ism, eager  service  and  a  sympathy  to  which  sorrow 
appeals.  There  are  few  young  men  in  the  pews. 
A  crippled  lad,  who  never  until  now  bewailed  his 
infirmity,  and  two  wounded  soldiers  are  there,  both 
of  the  parish.  One  sits  beside  his  widowed  mother, 
who  has  got  him  home  for  five  precious  days.  He  is 
her  only  son,  but  her  worn  face  is  almost  exultant  as 
she  sings  the  National  Anthem.  Behind  her  sits  a 
girl,  wife  for  a  week  and  now  a  widow.  A  keen- 
faced,  grey-haired  man  stands  erect,  facing  the  world 
proudly  in  the  knowledge  that  he  has  made  the  great 
sacrifice.  He  has  lost  two  sons  in  the  North  Sea, 
and  another,  a  mere  lad,  is  fretting  to  serve  his 
country.  His  youth,  not  his  parents'  will,  prevents 
him,  though  the  beautiful  old  house  now  set  in  its 
summer  leaf  and  flower  will  be  desolate  without  him. 


THE  KNEELING  HAMLET  271 

A  young  mother,  between  two  little  sons,  puts  a 
tender  arm  about  each  as  they  pray  for  those  in 
peril,  and  she  wonders  if  her  gratitude  for  their 
youth  is  selfishness.  The  row  of  small  scouts  in  the 
front  seat  are  awe-inspiring  in  their  dignity  and 
uprightness,  and  the  smallest,  who  sneezes,  is  re- 
garded by  the  others  with  reproach.  They  are  a 
by-product  of  the  war,  and  in  years  to  come  the 
nation  will  be  richer  for  the  lessons  of  service,  self- 
denial,  and  patriotism  that  they  are  now  eagerly 
learning. 

The  women  of  the  village,  in  their  scant  leisure, 
find  time  for  war  work,  and  even  the  smallest  girls 
crave  for  tasks  to  help  the  soldiers  and  find  pleasure 
in  doing  them.  The  service  seems  to  have  gained 
in  beauty  and  strength,  and  the  words  one  has 
repeated  all  these  careless  years  are  now  pregnant 
with  meaning.  The  appeal  of  the  prayers,  the 
triumph  of  the  militant  Psalms,  the  passionate  belief 
in  the  Resurrection  are  all  intensified  in  this  storm 
of  life.  What  other  consolation  has  squire  or 
peasant  whose  homes  are  empty  ?  The  little  church, 
for  all  its  calm  and  decorum,  is  an  arena  of  deep 
emotion,  but  it  is  fraught  with  more  than  sorrow. 

Into  the  summer  sunshine  and  the  hay-scented 
breezes  one  carries  back  to  the  daily  round  comfort, 
consolation,  and  a  fresh  strength  to  face  anxiety  and 
sorrow,  and  a  little  of  the  peace  that  "  passeth  all 
understanding."  After  centuries  the  little  church 
is  still  the  sanctuary  where  souls,  hunted  by  doubt 
and  despair,  find  peace  and  rest. 


THE  UNBURIED 

(AT  ANZAC,  DURING  THE  BLIZZARD  IN  THE 
WINTER  OF  1915) 

snow  flakes   thickly   jailing   in    the    winter 
breeze 

Have  cloaked  alike  the  hard  unbending  ilex 
And  the  grey  drooping  branches  of  the  olive  trees, 

Transmuting  into  silver  all  their  lead. 
Between  the  winding  lines  in  No-man's-land 
Are  softly  covered  with  a  glittering  shroud 
The  unburied  dead. 

And  in  the  silences  oj  night  when  winds  are  fair, 
When  shot  and  shell  have  ceased  their  wild  surprising, 

I  hear  a  sound  oj  music  in  the  upper  air 
Rising  and  Jailing  till  it  slowly  dies — 

The  beating  oj  the  wings  of  migrant  birds 

W aping  the  souls  of  these  unburied  heroes 
To  Paradise. 

FINIS. 


Printed  by  Butler  &  Tanner,  The  Selwood  Printing  Works,  Frome  and  London 


Br  THE  SAME  AUTHOR. 

A  CLIMBER  IN   NEW 
ZEALAND 

By  MALCOLM  ROSS,  A.C.,  F.R.G.S. 

With  Prefatory  Note  by  the 
RIGHT  HON,   VISCOUNT   BRYCE  ;OF   DECHMOUNT. 

With  numerous  beautiful  Illustrations  from  the  Author's 
Photographs. 

1  Vol.  Demy  8vo.     Price  15s.  nett. 

"  A  Climber  in  New  Zealand  is  an  over-modest  title  for 
this  record  by  Mr.  Ross  of  scrambles  and  ascents  on  the  New 
Zealand  Alps.  In  truth,  it  covers  more  than  the  personal 
adventures  of  any  one  climber  ;  and,  even  if  it  were  restricted  to 
Mr.  Malcolm  Ross's  own  expeditions,  they  make  up  so  large  a 
part  of  the  history  of  mountain  exploration  in  the  islands  as  to 
have  more  than  a  mere  personal  interest.  .  .  .  For  pluck, 
endurance  and  skill  there  is  no  more  splendid  feat  in  the  history 
of  mountaineering  in  any  continent ;  and  the  tale  is  told  with 
an  equal  dash  and  simplicity  which  will  always  give  it  a  place 
in  any  anthology  of  mountain  story.  .  .  .  Here  is  the  real  thing, 
great  mountains,  the  stars  and  the  flowers,  peril  and  hardship, 
and  an  adventurous  and  enduring  race." — The  Times. 

"  Mr.  Malcolm  Ross  in  his  light-hearted  and  admirably- 
written  volume  of  reminiscences  tells  the  story  of  the  slow 
conquests  of  the  New  Zealand  giants  and  of  many  other  upland 
wanderings.  .  .  .  Unlike  some  climbers  he  has  an  eye  for  other 
things  than  rock  and  snow,  and  describes  lovingly  the  strange 
bird-life  of  these  uplands.  If  we  had  to  give  our  vote  for  the 
most  entertaining  section  of  the  book,  it  would  be  for  the  account 
of  the  crossing  of  the  main  range  by  Mr.  Ross  and  Mr.  Fyfe.  .  .  . 
It  was  a  fine  piece  of  pioneering,  and  a  remarkable  experience, 
possible  only  for  climbers  in  a  new  land." — The  Spectator. 

"  He  is  a  New  Zealander  and  has  shown  himself  one  of  the 
most  daring  and  persevering  of  the  little  band  of  native  moun- 
taineers who  have  performed  such  wonders  during  the  past 
twenty  years  or  so.  Mr.  Ross's  account  of  his  climbing  adven- 
tures is  very  different  in  many  ways  from  the  orthodox  moun- 
taineering book  which  deals  with  the  Swiss  Alps.  ...  Mr.  Ross 
gives  us  much  thrilling  narrative  of  moments  of  danger  and 
excitement ;  those  half -minutes  when  we  would  have  '  sold  out 
mighty  cheap  an'  took  a  promise  for  the  money.'  " — Morning 
Post. 

LONDON :  EDWARD  ARNOLD. 


A  CLIMBER  IN  NEW 
ZEALAND 

PRESS     OPINIONS  . 

"  Mr.  Malcolm  Ross's  book  is  written  conspicuously  well. 
The  headings  to  its  chapters  suffice  in  themselves  to  stamp 
Mr.  Ross  as  a  man  of  letters.  ...  He  well  deserves  the  warm 
review  which  his  book  receives  from  Lord  Bryce — an  authority 
equally  on  books  and  on  mountains." — Manchester  Guardian. 

"  The  numerous  adventures  here  related  form  one  of  the  most 
fascinating  books  on  mountaineering.  .  .  .  Humour  and  appre- 
ciation of  the  glories  of  the  heights  make  the  book  still  more 
enjoyable.  The  numerous  excellent  photographs  tempt  one 
to  go  and  see  the  magnificent  original  scenery." — Glasgow  Herald. 

"  A  delightful  volume  which  many  will  be  glad  to  add  to  their 
Alpine  book-shelf." — Daily  Graphic. 

"  Mr.  Malcolm  Ross,  one  of  the  most  daring  and  most  per- 
severing of  native  climbers,  as  Lord  Brice  describes  him,  has 
produced  a  most  interesting  volume,  personal  and  historical. 
The  whole  story  ...  is  full  of  the  spirit  of  romance." — West- 
minster Gazette. 

"  Whether  dealing  with  his  own  adventures  or  the  achieve- 
ments of  others,  Mr.  Ross  writes  with  a  constant  enthusiasm, 
and  rarely  have  we  encountered  a  book  of  adventure  and  action 
written  with  greater  literary  finish,  or  one  in  which  the  humours 
and  realities  of  mountaineering  are  more  graphically  and  enter- 
tainingly described." — Pall  Mall  Gazette. 

"  The  book  is  one  to  be  read,  for  its  human  interest  as  well  as 
for  its  description  of  nature  in  some  of  her  sublimest  moods."  — 
The  Field. 

"  Well  written,  admirably  illustrated,  and  seems  likely  to 
remain  the  standard  work  on  the  subject." — The  Press  (Christ- 
church,  New  Zealand). 

"  He  possesses  the  pen  of  a  ready  and  graceful,  albeit  a  most 
laudably  modest  writer,  and  he  is  imbued  with  such  a  special 
spirit  of  enthusiasm  for  his  subject  that  whatever  he  has  written 
possesses  no  small  interest  for  the  general  reader. — The  Dominion 
(New  Zealand). 

"Mr.  Ross  has  a  very  pleasant  literary  style  and  at  times  is 
truly  eloquent  in  praise  of  the  superb  scenery  to  be  viewed  from 
his  much-loved  Alpine  heights." — The  Sun  (New  Zealand). 

LONDON :  EDWARD  ARNOLD. 


SELECTIONS   FROM 

MR    EDWARD  ARNOLD'S 

LIST   OF 

NEW  AND  RECENT  BOOKS 


Verdun  tO  the  VoSgeS.  Impressions  of  the 
War  on  the  Fortress  Frontier  of  France.  By  GERALD 
CAMPBELL,  Special  Correspondent  of  The  Times  in 
the  East  of  France.  With  Illustrations  and  Maps. 
IQS.  6d.  net. 

"  A  deeply  impressive,  well-informed  book.  Mr.  Campbell's  book 
will  well  repay  careful  and  patient  study.  It  penetrates  beneath  the 
surface  of  the  fighting." — Daily  Telegraph. 

"A  well-written  and  well-illustrated  volume.  Mr.  Campbell  had 
many  fine  opportunities,  and  used  them  both  wisely  and  well.  He 
gives  us  many  a  shocking  picture  of  the  brutality  and  bestiality  of  the 
German  invaders." — Morning  Post. 

"This  book  contains,  so  far  as  we  know,  the  only  careful  and  trust 
worthy  account  of  those  months  of  intense  fighting  which  has  yet  been 
published.  Historians  will  have  to  turn  to  these  pages  for  information 
in  regard  to  many  details  of  the  confused  events  of  the  early  days  in 
this  theatre. ' ' — 7  he  Times. 

A    French   Mother   in   War   time.     By 

MADAME  E.  DRUMONT.    Translated  by  Miss  G.  BEVIR. 
35.  6d.  net. 

The  writer  of  this  frank  and  simple  narrative  is  the  wife  of  the 
famous  anti-Semite,  but  the  young  airman  son,  to  whom  she  is  devotedly 
attached,  is  the  child  of  a  first  marriage.  The  volume  consists  of  her 
diary  from  July,  1914,  to  August,  1915.  This  anxious  French  mother 
makes  no  attempt  to  represent  herself  as  more  heroic  than  she  was  or 
is,  and  her  honesty  gives  a  special  value  to  her  picture  of  the  central 
and  really  fine  figure  in  the  book — that  of  her  son  Paul,  many  of  whose 
letters  to  her  during  the  war  are  here  given.  Among  other  interesting 
passages  in  the  book  is  a  description  of  the  scene  at  the  Paris  Cabinet 
Council,  when  General  Gallieni  was  asked  by  the  Ministry  if  he  would 
defend  Paris. 

LONDON:  EDWARD  ARNOLD,  41  &  43  MADDOX  STREET,  W. 


2      MR.  EDWARD  ARNOLD'S  NEW  AND  RECENT  BOOKS 

A   Surgeon    in    Khaki.     By  A.  A.  MARTIN, 

M.D.,  F.R.C.S.  Eng.     With  Illustrations.    Fifth  Impres- 
sion,    i os.  6d.  net. 

"  A  superlatively  interesting  book." — Graphic. 

"  A  book  full  of  life  and  human  feeling.  '  A  Surgeon  in  Khaki '  will 
certainly  live  as  a  first-class  description  of  a  portion  of  the  great  war." 
—Field. 

"  A  book  of  extraordinary  interest.  There  are  many  stories,  grave 
and  gay,  in  this  book,  which  should  be  widely  read.  It  is  quite  a  re- 
markable book,  and  gives  a  wonderful  vision  of  what  war  is." — 
Birmingham  Daily  Post. 

With  Our   Army    in   Flanders ,    1915- 

By    G.    VALENTINE    WILLIAMS.      Illustrated.      Second 
Impression.     125.  6d.  net. 

"  Mr.  Williams  has  written  an  excellent  book,  one  of  the  most  vivid 
and  informing  accounts  that  have  yet  been  produced  of  our  men  in  the 
field.  Like  all  good  correspondents,  he  has  an  eye  for  significant 
detail.  His  knowledge  of  Germany  helps  him  to  many  instructive 
comparisons.  He  is  the  master  of  an  easy,  vigorous  style,  which 
occasionally  reaches  real  eloquence.  Above  all,  he  has  a  great  gift  of 
enthusiasm.  The  book  is  written  in  a  fine  spirit,  not  captious,  or 
egotistical,  or  flamboyant,  but  honest  and  understanding." — Spectator. 

"  This  book  is  no  mere  compilation  of  the  day-to-day  dispatches 
from  Mr.  Williams,  but  a  complete  study  of  the  army  at  work  and  at 
play,  touched  by  many  a  scene  of  pathos,  enlivened  by  many  a  page  of 
vivacious  anecdote,  and  marked  throughout  by  keen  study  of  all  the 
phases  and  problems  of  the  war." — Daily  Mail. 

The  Capture  of  De   Wet.    including  a  Short 

Account  of  the  Conquest  of  German  South- West  Africa. 
By  P.  J.  SAMPSON.     Illustrated.     los.  6d.  net. 

"  /  have  perused  the  work  with  interest,  and  must  congratulate  you  on  the 
accurate,  impartial,  and  comprehensive  manner  in  which  you  have  dealt  with  a 
much-to-be-regretted  episode  in  the  history  of  South  Africa." —From  GENERAL 
BOTHA'S  letter  to  the  Author. 

"  What  he  unfolds  is  a  drama — we  might  almost  call  it  an  epic — of 
South  Africa  in  action,  in  which  the  principal  figures  stand  out  boldly 
and  the  principal  events  happen  again  before  our  eyes." — Morning  Post. 

Germany  and  the  Next  War.    By  General 

F.  VON  BERNHARDI.     Paper,  2S.  net;    cloth,  25.  6d. 
net. 


MR.  EDWARD  ARNOLD'S  NEW  AND  RECENT  BOOKS        3 

A  Year  AgO.  Being  the  concluding  portion  of 
"  Eye- Witness's  Narrative  of  the  War,"  from  March 
to  July,  1915,  when  the  series  of  articles  came  to  an 
end.  By  COL.  E.  D.  SWINTON,  R.E.,  D.S.O.,  and  CAPT. 
THE  EARL  PERCY.  Crown  8vo,  paper,  25.  net ;  cloth, 
2s.  6d.  net. 

The  principal  event  in  the  period  covered  by  the  new  volume  is  the 
second  battle  of  Ypres,  where  the  Canadians  so  distinguished  themselves. 
There  are  also  general  descriptions  of  the  new  warfare  in  all  its  novel 
phases,  from  the  base  to  the  front-line  trenches,  that  contain  an 
immense  amount  of  information  deeply  interesting  to  the  civilian 
reader. 

Eye- Witness's    Narrative   of  the    War. 

From  the  Marne  to  Neuve  Chapelle,  September,  1914 
—March,  1915.  312  pp.  Crown  8vo.  Paper,  is.  net; 
cloth,  2s.  net. 

Gives  the  complete  narrative  of  "  Eye  Witness  "  as  issued  by  the 
Press  Bureau,  and,  read  consecutively  in  this  narrative  form,  makes  an 
extremely  interesting  and  illuminating  commentary  on  the  operations 
and  achievements  of  the  Expeditionary  Force. 

"  Pending  the  time  when  a  full  history  of  the  European  conflict  will 
be  possible,  there  can  be  nothing  better  in  the  way  of  a  brief  general 
survey  of  the  British  operations  than  'Eye-Witness's  Narrative.'" — 
Illustrated  London  News. 

A  Surgeon  in  Belgium.    By  H.  s.  SOUTTAR, 

F.R.C.S.,  Late  Surgeon-in-Chief  of  the  Belgian  Field 
Hospital.  Demy  8vo.  8s.  6d.  net.  Third  Impression. 
Also  a  Popular  Edition,  paper  cover,  2s.  net;  cloth, 
2S.  6d.  net. 

"  If  all  war  books  were  like  this  one,  it  is  safe  to  say  that  we  should 
hear  no  complaint  that  the  public  is  already  weary  of  volumes  dealing 
with  the  great  conflict.  For,  in  place  of  the  average  piece  of  journal- 
istic hack-work,  we  have  here  a  live  book,  a  book  with  a  character  and 
a  soul,  a  book  whose  literary  skill  and  deep  human  feeling  justify  the 
prediction  that  it  will  be  found  among  the  few  elect  records  which  sur- 
vive their  hour,  and  are  still  remembered  and  consulted  in  years  to 
come." — Daily  Telegraph. 

"Admirably  written  and  readable  from  beginning  to  end. "— Morning 
Post. 

"Mr.  Souttar  is  a  surgeon  with  a  gift  for  vivid  writing.  His  book  is 
a  quite  fascinating  record  of  his  experience." — Daily  News. 

"Among  the  multitude  of  books  on  the  war  this  must  surely  hold  a 
foremost  place." — Westminster  Gazette. 


4        MR.  EDWARD  ARNOLD'S  NEW  AND  RECENT  BOOKS 

Years  Ot  Childhood.  By  SERGE  AKSAKOFF. 
Translated  from  the  Russian  by  J.  D.  DUFF,  Fellow  of 
Trinity  College,  Cambridge.  los.  6d.  net. 

"  One  can  hardly  thank  the  translator  sufficiently  for  this  first  render- 
ing of  the  book  in  any  other  language  than  Russian." — The  Times. 

"  '  Years  of  Childhood'  becomes  the  more  fascinating  the  more  one 
reads  and  thinks  about  it.  Aksakoff  read  a  new  and  ecstatic  meaning 
into  things  which  are  banal  and  tame  to  most  men  and  women,  and 
the  eager  eye  of  his  mind  scanned  deep  into  the  lives  and  loves  of  the 
people  round  about  him." — Morning  Post. 

Thirty -Five  Years  in  the  New  Forest. 

By  the  HON  GERALD  LASCELLES.     With  Illustrations. 
I2s.  6d.  net. 

"A  delightful  blend  of  sport,  forestry,  and  tradition." — Saturday 
Review. 

"  A  book  for  the  readers  of  Country  Life.  They  are  sure  to  delight  in 
it." — Country  Life. 

Thirty    Years    a    Boxing    Referee.    By 

EUGENE  CORRI.     Illustrated,     IDS.  6d,  net. 

"  A  genuine  treat  for  all  lovers  of  boxing.'' — Referee. 
"  This  breezy  book  on  boxing  is  just  characteristic  of  the  author.     It 
is  a  great  cheery  volume  to  the  end."— Morning  Post. 

Froth  and   Bubble.     By  MONTY  HARBORD.     Illus- 
trated,    i  os.  6d.  net. 

"As  full  of  incident  and  adventure  as  'Monte  Cristo.'  Whether 
ranching  in  Montana,  or  fighting  in  South  Africa,  or  fighting  against 
Nature  in  British  East  Africa,  we  always  have  the  feeling  that  we  are 
getting  nothing  but  the  truth. ' ' — Evening  Standard. 

"  A  book  more  full  of  the  joy  of  a  roaming  life  and  of  the  delight  of 
conflict  there  could  not  be  than  '  Froth  and  Bubble.'  " — Westminster 
Gazette. 

Reminiscences  of  John   Adye  Curran, 

K.C.     ios.  6d.  net. 

"  Many  have  pretended  to  lift  the  veil  [of  the  Phoenix  Park  murders], 
but  Judge  Curran  for  the  first  time  really  lets  in  the  daylight.  His 
tales  of  the  Irish  Bar  and  Bench  make  excellent  reading." — Northern 
Whig. 

J  Ballads  of  the  Fleet.  By  SIR  RENNELL  RODD, 
G.C.M.G.,  British  Ambassador  at  Rome.  New  and 
Cheaper  Edition,  as.  6d.  net. 

LONDON  :  EDWARD  ARNOLD,  41  &  43,  MADDOX  STREET,  W. 


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